Much More Than a Slave
by Splays
Summary: Hermione becomes Harry's slave. None of them really has liked the idea but they have needed to prevent Draco from enslaving her first so they have not had a choice. After that, they try to restore their friendship and even find a use in their new situation. But that also leads to new problems.
1. Chapter 1

**Much More Than a Slave**

* * *

**Chapter 1:**

Once again, Hermione had had a fight with Ron and was now sitting in the library to calm down and do some studying. Could he for once stop whining about how poor his family was? She herself was living from the money Hogwarts gave to muggleborn students which was not exactly much. While she was angrily looking for a book on the history of especially dark magicians she stumbled across a book which certainly did not fit in the section 'History'. "This book is not supposed to have a place in the public part of the library", she thought upon reading a few pages in it. This book was probably the book with the darkest magic she had ever seen. In it she found instructions on creating inferi from living wizards which made them have magical abilities but still not have the need to breathe or other things any living creature needs to do to survive. The instruction on it made her go pale and then almost vomit.

She was just about to close the book and inform Madam Pince about it when a new topic struck her eyes: 'Slave bonds between Wizards and Witches'. There could not possibly be something like slave bonds_? _But then she remembered Professor Binns little hint that enslavement had not only happened from wizards to other races which he had given them last week. With now slightly trembling hands she reopened the book which she had closed in panic and read the text below the headline. Five minutes later Hermione quickly put the book back to its place and without even mentioning it to Madam Pince she went to the Gryffindor Tower. Harry and Ron apparently had not finished dinner yet so she went straight to the still empty dormitory.

This was just so wrong. If this book was right any wizard had the ability to enslave any witch, simply by casting a spell on her. That meant... Suddenly she panicked. She had left the book in the public section! Anyone could read it now and if someone like Malfoy got hold on it, it would end in a total disaster! She quickly ran out of her dormitory, out of the Gryffindor Tower into the library. But what she found did not relax her at all. On the exact place where she had put the book into the shelf was the book no longer. She scanned nearly the whole library and only quickly left when Madam Pince asked her if she was looking for something. Someone had taken the book and would almost definitely read about the slave bonds_. _

"Hello little Mudblood!" Malfoy had sneaked up behind her and grinned evilly. "Enjoying your last days of studying?"

"What is that supposed to mean?", Hermione replied slightly confused though annoyed when she suddenly recognised what he was holding. Malfoy did not miss that and he just smiled even broader, "Oh think you will find out soon enough".

After that she was almost entirely sure that Malfoy was planning to enslave her and there was hardly anything she could do about it. But more than this, he could enslave anyone without even anyone noticing. She needed to act now. She went back into the common room where she found Harry sitting on an armchair near the fire. "Can I borrow your Invisibility Cloak tonight? I need to get a book from the library for the potions essay for tomorrow."

"Sure", he said distractedly and gave her the cloak. What she actually wanted to do was to find other books on that topic that would help her protect herself.

In the library she quickly noticed that the Restricted Section was only locked by a simple muggle lock which she quickly opened. Relieved that she had apparently set off no alarm she started her research. After about an hour she had read through five different books. Apparently this topic was more complex than she had thought. The spell had been invented by Salazar Slytherin himself after he had left Hogwarts. But he also put some highly complex charms on the spell itself which made it impossible to directly share its use, its source or anything about it. If you tried to, you would forget everything about the spell and you would be rendered impossible to obtain the information back. That made Hermione relax a little, hoping Malfoy would just try to brag about this spell and forget about is more is that apparently this spell can be used only once by one person. Slightly relieved, Hermione put all books back to their intitial place, locked the door to the Restricted Section and went back to the common room. It was now nearly empty so Hermione's arrive went unnoticed. Harry was still sitting in the armchair so she slipped the cloak to him, quietly thanked him and entered her dormitory.

There she grabbed a shirt from her trunk, closed the curtains on her bed and started enchanting it, as well as her Hogwarts uniform. She cast several protection charms that would hopefully deflect any spell if Malfoy tried to use a spell on her. It took her two hours to cast all spells because she did it very thoroughly as she wanted to be entirely safe. Malfoy may be an arrogant little brat that would brag about everything which would instantly erase all danger but she really did not want to risk him enslaving her.

The next day when she went to breakfast she stayed close to Ron and Harry, so Draco would not dare attack her. When they entered the Great Hall Draco was sitting at the Slytherin table but he was constantly looking toward them. All day Hermione kept an eye on him but also never took very much distance from Harry and Ron. One time when she was walking a few meters behind them she felt someone walking behind her. She seized her wand and quickly turned around to see exactly as she had feared Draco walking about 10 meters behind her pointing his wand at her. Upon that Draco quickly turned around and walked away.

Over the next few days Hermione found herself multiple time in similar situations. Finally she decided that Draco was keeping his secret so she needed to act. Why he had not kidnapped her yet she did not know but she definitely did not want to wait until it was too late. Apparently she was his main target so she did not have to worry about anyone else. But the enchantments on her cloths were not the best protection and she needed to find a better solution. Reporting it to a teacher would do exactly nothing as he had not done anything yet and in addition to that she would have to work around the taboo. She desperately tried to find a solution to stop Draco. Maybe she could trick him into talking about it? But how would she do it? If she talked to him herself she risked him jinxing her. And she could not risk instructing someone else to do it as she might lose all memories about the charm in the process. While rereading the notes she had taken on that topic she got an idea. According to her notes you could only be enslaved to one person at a time. So if she was to be enslaved to someone else she could let Malfoy try to use the spell on her, if she was lucky even get him to try and talk about it to her. Then he would either not be able to use the spell again or even forget about it completely. But that would still make her a slave and since slave bonds are unbreakable she would have to live with that for her entire life. She grimaced at that idea. Moreover, none of the books could give her detailed information about what the consequences the bond had. Quickly she decided that she was not going to enslave herself and tried to find another solution. That went on for another week and as time went on Hermione became more and more desperate and even skipped classes to go to the girls' bathroom and cry.

"Hermione, is everything alright with you? You are so pale. Maybe you should go and see Madam Pomfrey." Harry had approached her one day after dinner when she again had skipped two classes. "I'm really worried. Skipping so many classes isn't something you normally do. Is there anything you want to talk about?"

"Good Morning! If I were you, Potter, I would enjoy the last days with your friend! I mean, there are like, let's say, only four days left!" Draco had approached them.

"What are you talking about, Malfoy?" Harry asked enraged.

"Oh, just as I told the little mudblood already, you'll find out soon enough! What a pity, all her studying... for nothing!" Laughing he went back to the Slytherin table.

"What is he talking about?", Harry asked bewildered.

"I don't know. He has been saying stuff like that to me for over a week now and I still have no clue what he actually wants. I hope he just wants to annoy me. But he had never mentioned the four days before."

"Don't worry, he's probably just trying to mess around with you", Harry replied, though not very convinced. He look her into the eyes noticing just how worried she looked. "Hey, he has always been a jerk and he never did anything serious, so why should he now?", he sighed. He was silent for a second, "But you know. If you want to talk about anything, I will listen to you." With a sad smile he got up and said, "Come on, let's get up to the common room."

When they arrived in the Gryffindor Tower she told him she wanted to go bed early today and went to the girls' dormitory. This was the first time Draco had told her a specific date and that meant that he had made a plan. Hermione felt sick out of terror. What could she do? Just not go to the classes? There would be no advantage as he would realize his plan some day else and she could not hide in her dormitory forever. She had been practicing disillusionment charms for the past week so she could get from class to class unnoticed. But then again, what if Draco had something like the marauders' map? Furthermore, it would be difficult to apply and put off the charm unnoticed and Draco could catch her the moment when she looked for a place to apply the charm unnoticed.

She decided that she would have to go back to the library. There had to be some kind of antidote or whatsoever. She applied the Disillusionment charm in the at the moment still empty dormitory, remarking delightedly that she was almost entirely invisible. She put additionally a silencing charm on herself and went to the common room. Harry had apparently gone to bed himself since Ron was sitting with Dean and Seamus. She crossed the room and climbed through the portrait hole. What she did not notice though was that when she was descending the stairs she was being followed.

When she arrived at the library she unlocked the the door to the Restricted Section and went inside. Quickly checking that it was empty she took out five books that seemed to contain information about dark magic like slave bonds. She took out paper and her quill started copying the information. After about an hour and a half she put back the books and took out another piece of paper. She wrote as the headline "plans". She wanted to systematically go through all her possibilities and pick out the best. She wrote down "Enslave myself". Then she added a note that she needed to inform someone indirectly and she needed to find the person whom she could trust and would be willing to live with this person for the rest of her life. She continued with the second plan, "leaving Hogwarts". Again she wrote down all problems and continued with the next plan. After 30 minutes she had list with 13 plans but none of them were really good or even at least acceptable for example "Killing Malfoy". She would get herself a cell in Azkaban if she got caught. She then rated them to find the best of them. She ended up deciding between "Enslave myself" and "Feeding Malfoy Veritaserum". The latter was supposed to obliviate Malfoy by making him try to talk about the charm which would almost definitely work if she got him to drink it. The downsides however were that she had to somehow even get some Veritaserum which was not only illegal but also a highly difficult potion. Moreover Draco would understand that he had been dosed with Veritaserum which would throw her definitely in Azkaban. She sighed as Azkaban is hardly better than being a slave. After a few minutes of consideration she circled "Enslave myself" which led her to a mental breakdown.

"Because of this stupid idiot I have to get myself into a slave bond without even knowing, and this is definitely the worst part about it, what consequences there will be", she thought angrily_. _After five minutes of silent crying she calmed down a bit. She had wanted to do this systematically. She would make a list on who would be a potential person to form the bond with. But first she had to find the criteria_. _So she made a table putting in the columns the criteria: trustworthiness, empathy, character, respect and level of acquaintance. In the lines she wrote the names: Ron, Harry, Neville, Mr Weasley, Fred, George and Percy. When she had finished evaluating she was left with two candidates that were the most fitting: Neville and Harry. Ron and Percy had been sorted out because of a lack of empathy, Fred, George and Mr Weasley because of a low level of acquaintance. Harry she personally did not want to form the bond with because she knew he had already enough trouble even though she would probably get along with him the best. And Neville she knew was very respectful and trustworthy but she just did not know him as well as Harry. After reconsidering between those two and coming to no conclusion she gave up for that night packed up all her notes and went to the Gryffindor Tower. She left behind a very distraught Harry.

Harry had watched the marauders' map when Hermione left to go to the library. He had hoped to find out what Draco was doing because he was not at all convinced that Draco had not planned anything. When he saw Hermione leaving the common room he quickly put on the invisibility cloak and followed her. He felt a bit bad spying on her but he was very concerned about her behaviour. He even suspected that she had been possessed just like Ginny in her first year. When she took the books from the shelf he was a bit taken aback. What was she planning to do with such dark magic? When he read her notes on her plans he slowly began to understand and was totally shocked. How could Malfoy try to do something like that? But it made perfectly sense, his comments, his behavior. When she left Harry took out the books she had read and informed himself about the subject. He came to the conclusion that they had a massive problem. There was no word about a counter-jinx, an antidote or whatsoever. Unfortunately, he had to agree with Hermione, there was really no better way out of the situation than what she had written down. Harry shuddered as he remembered how she had been crying when realizing what she had to do. He did not feel any better since he was mentioned in the table and his name even had been circled with just one other. He did not want to do something like that to Hermione but on the other hand he realised that it was his duty now because he already knew about the problem which is not the case with Neville. Furthermore by not forming the bond he was being unfair to both Hermione and Neville since he knew she would prefer the bond with him and he knew that it would not be any easier for Neville than for him. That were three strong arguments and yet Harry could even decide to talk to Hermione. But as he imagined Hermione being enslaved to Malfoy which was a risk that was growing day by day he realized he had to act now. He knew it would be his fault if Hermione was enslaved before she could approach him and that he could never stand this guilt. With trembling hands and legs he returned to his dormitory.

When he climbed through the portrait hole he realized that the common room was not empty. There was, sitting in an armchair in a dark corner, Hermione crying silently. As he entered the room she looked up to see that there was no one. She instantly grabbed her wand firing a Pretrificus Totalus in Harry's direction. She hit him on the left shoulder so Harry froze and fell down. Carefully she approached him. When he fell down, the cloak had fallen off of his hands. She pulled off the cloak just to see Harry lying frozen on the ground. Panicking she removed the petrification curse and started apologizing, "Harry, I'm so sorry, I thought you were..." She trailed. With a suffocated scream she ran out of the common room into the big staircase, followed by Harry.

"Wait, where are you going? I need to talk to you!" What he saw when he reached her let his blood in the veins freeze: Hermione was standing at the railing, shaking enormously with one leg already on the other side, where she would await a fall of at least 50 meters. "I can't. This is the only way", she cried. "Please, let me help you, please, please don't do this", Harry was now trembling nearly as much as Hermione. When his legs would not support him any longer he sank to his knees. "You don't know what's happening to me and I'm physically not able to tell you."

"I do know. Please, please, get away from this abyss."

"You cannot know. Nobody knows. I have to do this alone.", she responded, tears running down her cheek. Harry inhaled deeply and started again, "Hermione. If you kill yourself, Malfoy will seek another victim. Please." At this Hermione turned to him looking a bit surprised through her tears. He was right. She slowly pulled her leg back on the ground, now crying even heavier. Harry still trembling got back on his legs trying very hard not to instantly fall back on the ground. He supported Hermione as she climbed through the portrait hole.

They sat down in the armchairs near the now cold fireplace which Harry quietly relighted. "Hermione. I need to confess something to you. When you left the common room this evening I followed you. I was watching the marauders' map because I was trying to find out more about what Malfoy was doing when I suddenly saw you leaving the common room. You know that I usually wouldn't do that to a friend but I was really concerned after that encounter with Malfoy." Hermione was shocked. She had never expected Harry to spy on her especially since she knew he would trusted her with his life. She was surprised by how much he actually cared for her as he was apparently telling the truth. "So you know?" she asked quietly. "I'm really sorry."

"It's okay, it's okay. That takes away some trouble. Did you read my notes?"

"Yes, I did. Do you stick with your decision?" Secretly he was hoping for a no but she nodded her head sadly. "I have read everything I could find on that topic so yes, I know about _it_", he explained hoping she understood that he meant the taboo with "it". Apparently she had as she let out little sigh relieve. "So, you want me to do it?", Harry asked anxious again hoping for a "no" but after a while Hermione almost unnoticeable nodded. She burst into tears and Harry had trouble holding back his tears as he was quietly staring into the darkness. "When should we do it?", he finally asked.

"You know that we are risking _it_ every day we wait?" There was a minute of silence. Harry said nothing as he knew that Hermione needed time to consider. Finally she brought out a word, almost inaudible: "Now."

Shocked by her response he asked, "Are you sure?" She nodded. Then both simultaneously burst out in tears. It was over. Her life was no longer hers. But at least it was Harry who would own her, not Malfoy. Harry would treat her with respect and give her as much freedom as she needed. Or as he could. After all, they still did not know about the consequences. What if she got marked? What if the spell changed her personality? She could not think about that now, because, as she had figured out just a few hours ago, there was no other way. Harry was not feeling any better. What would Hermione think of him? She surely would hate him and he would lose one of his two best friends. And what if the others found out? No one would ever talk to him again. Would he be expelled?

"Do it", Hermione said quietly. With trembling fingers Harry took his wand. He raised his arm pointing the wand at her. She was crying now. Harry got nervous. Hermione was hyperventilating. What if he failed with the spell? The book said that you had only one single attempt. Hermione closed her eyes. He closed his eyes. He took a deep breath. "**Bunde Herrum"**.


	2. Chapter 2

**Chapter 2:**

A blue cloud came out of Harry's wand and flew into Hermione's heart. The process hold on for ten seconds before it stopped. Trembling Harry lowered his wand. He noticed that there was something on his finger. A simple entirely blue ring had appeared on the ring finger of his left hand. Relieved, Harry noticed that this was the only change on him. Hermione however apparently had have much worse luck. There was a black leather collar around her neck with a shining blue "P" on the right and on the left. On her back, where she had felt a stinging pain when the spell was complete, there was another "P" but this one was though shining just as blue as the ones on her collar burned into her skin.

Now Hermione was really panicking while trying to find a way to put off the collar. "How can I ever show me with this? My life is ruined. No wizard or witch will see me as a human anymore. And what will my parents say?" Harry was totally distraught. What had he done? He wanted to save her from being a slave to Malfoy but he did not want to mark her as his slave. When he tried to pull his ring off suddenly two letters appeared suspended mid-air in front of Harry and Hermione. While Harry's envelope seemed completely normal Hermione could not say the same about hers. On the envelope she was not addressed as "Miss Granger" but as "Slave Granger-Potter". Completely dissolved both opened their letter. There was on neither of both letters the name of the sender.

Harry's letter actually contained very helpful information, for example did it explain the function of the ring. Depending on how often you tap on it with your want you can make the slave's mark, the emblems on the collar or the collar itself dis- and reappear. It also assured him that the taboo was not active between master and slave. Hermione's letter however was, though it was surely meant as good advice, not helping her emotional state at all. It was full of things like that the slave is always to be obedient to the master and so on which made Hermione almost lose all hope. After they had silently exchanged their letters due to their current inability to speak Hermione was slightly relieved as she would not have to reveal her new status. Harry was enraged over Hermione's letter so he then started to prepare her for a normal life. First he vanished the collar and the mark. Then he gave her the permission to do everything a normal witch was allowed to do thus making her basically a free witch. The property contract that came with his letter he later put down the bottom of his trunk. His ring he put in his pocket so no one would ever be able to use it and expose her new status. Both letters they shrank to the size of a finger nail and Hermione later put them into a make up box. Relieved that the bonding process went off fairly acceptable they went into their dormitories with just few words of Goodbye as both of them were very tired.

Next morning at breakfast Harry was sitting with Ron, Dean and Seamus and Hermione is sitting a little distanced with Ginny and Parvati. They had both slept very little and were not really ready to talk to each other though Hermione was very thankful that Harry helped her and he was relieved that she did not seem to hate him. As both of them had suspected Draco was once more moving toward the Gryffindor table. "You know... I have changed my mind. So. Enjoy your last proper meal. See you then!" Draco had only made a brief visit so Harry could not say anything to him before he left sniggering.

"Stupid brat!", Harry exclaimed. He caught eye with Hermione who then gestured away from the Great Hall. Harry nodded. He quickly finished breakfast and left inconspicuously. He waited at the entry of the Great Hall. Hermione came a minute later.

"Let's go in an empty corridor." Harry followed her as she went off somewhere near the library.

"First off, I've read about bonds in general before breakfast. Apparently this bond provides a mental connection. I think we should train ourselves using it as it seems pretty handy. According to _Bonds, More Than Just Law _you can even communicate by speech if you train the connection well enough. But we need to worry about Malfoy first. I'm not sure what he will exactly do to form the bond but chances are he will kidnap me beforehand. I think it would be the best if you followed me under the invisibility cloak so it seems like I am alone. I will go deliberately through corridors that almost no one uses. That way he might feel safe enough to enslave me directly. However, if he kidnaps me anyway, try to follow him. Only interfere if he tries to harm me or is on his way to go out of reach, like the Slytherin common room. With a bit of luck this topic will be over this evening."

"Yeah, I hope so. I could cast a tracing charm on you, just in case...", he suggested though he knew it was already provided by bond.

"I don't think that's still necessary", she replied sadly, "You can always trace with the bond."

"Oh, yeah, right.", he quietly agreed and pointing to his pocket he added, "In terms of Malfoy, I have the marauders' map so I'll know when he comes."

Harry followed Hermione from class to class, sometimes making unnecessary detours through some lonely corridors. But nothing had happened until Divination so Harry had to skip his class as Hermione had Runes at the same time. Harry accompanied her to the class room and waited outside. He took out the marauders' map looking for Draco. He found him wandering around in a corridor one floor below him. He was moving from class room to class room. When he had visited each one in the corridor he left the corridor. When he got to the staircase Harry lost because he did not immediately find the right floor as they were a bit distributed over the map. But he did no longer need to find him on the map as he heard steps to his right. Quickly he folded the marauders' map and stuffed it into his pocket. Looking around the corner he was just in time to see Draco sliding into a class room. Harry got to the class room and carefully approached the door. When he heard steps in the back of the class he knew he could risk looking through the keyhole now. He was relieved as he just saw Draco sitting on a table, apparently waiting. Harry kept watching him. After a while got up and took out his wand. Worried that he might have seen him, Harry got ready to get away from the door, but Draco did not move. Instead he pointed his wand on himself and after whispering an incantation he became invisible. He had cast just like Hermione an Disillusionment charm. He did a considerable worse job though as you could still see his shadow. Harry waited if he cast another spell but his wand which was still visible did not move. Suddenly Harry got an idea: He could try to communicate to Hermione via the connection provided by the bond. If Malfoy saw her now he would not have to worry about other students and he might just cast the enslavement charm without any other safety precautions.

Harry had already made some experience with mental connection when Voldemort had possessed him. Remembering how he had answered him he tried to do the same to contact Hermione. He imagined she was in front of her while also thinking of her leaving the class room. He tried to contact her for one minute before his concentration broke. But then he already heard steps coming from the class room, then an opening door and saw Hermione coming out of the class room. He slipped down the hood of his invisibility cloak so Hermione would see her. She sighed relieved, "Did you call me? I had suddenly those brief visions of me exiting the room so I thought..."

"Yes, it was me. Listen, Draco is in this class room. I think would be best if he tried to enslave you now." She nodded nervously. "Don't worry, Hermione. I'll be with you."

With seemingly self-confident steps she walked past Draco's class room. As she had passed it, the door opened just an centimeter. When Draco saw it was Hermione, he carefully opened the door slid through it. He walked close up to Hermione and then he whispered "Petrificus Totalus". Hermione was instantly petrified and to her great relieved she was caught by Draco, thus preventing her from falling on the stone hard ground. As Draco pulled Hermione toward to the empty class room Harry silently entered it. Carrying Hermione in one arm Draco too entered the room and immediately shut the door. He laid her on teacher's desk and pointed his wand at her. Hermione would be trembling so hard that she would fall off the desk immediately if she were not petrified. Again panic rose in her. She had not at all expected that he would act that quick. What if he did not even want to enslave her and do something even worse? What if her old bond with Harry broke when he cast the spell? What if the book was wrong in the first place and she could form two separate master-slave bonds? It was too late now. "Bunde Herrum" This time a silver cloud flew out of Malfoy's wand. But it did not enter Hermione's heart how it had happened with Harry. Instead the cloud formed a thin silver layer all over Hermione, separated only by a millimeter of air from Hermione's body. This process took considerable more time than when Harry had done it. So after about a minute Hermione was all covered in a silver cloud. Then the stream of silver emerging from Draco's wand stopped. The silver layer on Hermione now started forming a ball which slowly swept toward Draco. He reached for it and the moment he had touched it he fainted.

Harry went over to Hermione and freed her of the Petrification charm and put off his cloak. He leaned down to her ear and whispered "Is everything okay with you?"

"I think so", she replied.

"I will wake him. Act as if the spell had worked and try to get him to talk about the bond. Otherwise he might find a way to pass on the information and it would be the same all over again. Also I will make the collar visible again but without the emblems so he doesn't get suspicious" She nodded. "I will petrify you and wake him now. Okay?" She nodded. "Petrificus Totalus" First he tapped his ring a couple of times with his wand and then walked over to Malfoy, put on his cloak again and cast "Enervate".

A bit confused Draco woke up. Seeing Hermione was still petrified he got up and inspected her. He noticed the collar on her neck and smiled confidently as he was sure it had not been there before. Being absolutely sure that he had enslaved her he removed the body binding curse. "Now little mudblood... what could I make you now. Hmm... Let's start it off easy, clap three times", he ordered grinningly.

Hermione who had gotten up and pointed her wand at Draco sourly replied "Why should I" but before she had even finished her sentence she had dropped her wand and clapped three times. Horrified she screamed at him, "What have you done! Stop this! I will get you expelled!" She seemed to be really terrified and Harry was impressed by her acting skills.

"I will tell what I've done to you. It's rather simple: I have you- ". He stopped mid-sentence and his eyes seemed unfocused for a moment. Hermione used this brief moment to pick up her wand. Then he stared at her in confusion. Understanding that he did no longer know what he was doing here Hermione pointed her want at him "Exit this room or I'll jinx you!" Totally taken aback he complied and ran out of the room.

Harry who had watched the whole scene, ready to attack if it was necessary pulled off his cloak and wiped away the sweat on his forehead. "Your acting was amazing", he complimented her.

"Thanks", she replied smiling nervously.

Taking a look on his watch Harry suggested, "Let's go and get some dinner. They'll be missing us already."

They were just a few meters away from the Great Hall when Harry suddenly pulled her aside. "Shit! I did not remove the collar!", he explained and Hermione instantly tried to cover her neck as a group of third years was approaching. Harry quickly took out his ring and let the collar disappear. He quickly checked her back just to be sure that he had not accidentally made the marking visible. As this was not the case they entered the Great Hall to finally enjoy there dinner. "Hi Hermione, hi Harry, where have you been?", Neville asked when they sat down on the Gryffindor table.

"Well... we...", began Harry.

"We had a little argument on whether Runes was a complete waste of time or if it is a subject with a huge potential because of the still not entirely translated ancient wizards' spell books", Hermione interrupted seemingly annoyed. Harry gave a little smile to Neville who returned it knowing that Harry did not have a chance in an argument against Hermione.

"What else is on the plan for today? Ugh, double potions and history. Kill me, Neville", he sighed to which Neville responded to with laughter. They enjoyed the rest of the dinner before getting their stuff for potions and history. Harry was really looking forward to this evening as he could finally get to sleep without being plagued by sorrow.


	3. Chapter 3

**Chapter 3:**

The following days Hermione did not talk very much. Though both had tried to hide it they knew that their relation had changed. It was not even the case that Harry treated her different or something. But nonetheless they knew that he had theoretically complete control over her and that made it for both very hard to talk to each other. Harry always feared that he would get disrespectful and offend her. He was aware that she had ordered him to enslave her but he also knew that she was not very pleased to do so. Hermione was a very proud girl who would always fight for her right. But this bond made her not only dependent to someone else and made her lose all her rights but it also gave her a status that made everyone, even muggles, look down on her.

But most importantly, both of them deeply feared the exposure of their bond as Harry too would get into a lot of trouble. Caused by the taboo he would have a hard time explaining to anyone why he had enslaved her since he could not even say that he enslaved her. Everyone with even half a brain would think of him as a horrible person if he failed to explain himself. He would lose all of his friends and if he was not expelled right away every single teacher and student would hate him. He could already imagine Rita Skeeter's new bestseller: "Harry Potter: From Destroying the Evil to Becoming the Devil" in which she would speculate on how he forced the bond on themselves and how he had raped and abused her.

For Hermione the exposure would not have better consequences at all. Sure, she would get a lot of support from the teachers and fellow students but she did not really want this. By that she would get pity for something which did not happen and above all with Harry suffering from it. But worse than that, she knew that there were people out there who would not pity her at all, on the contrary that were people like Malfoy who would think that she deserved all that and would treat her without any respect. And she was sure that did not only include Slytherins and Death Eaters. Just because someone is particularly brave or hardworking does that not mean that they were not simply horrible persons disguising themselves as the good guys. Apart from that there were still a lot of not so extreme people who would not openly look down on her but still would at least be judging her on account of her status.

That was why Harry spent the next weeks mainly with Ron and constantly avoided Hermione. It was a very painful experience and he felt like he was reliving his fourth year where he had not talked to Ron until after the first task of the Triwizard Tournament. Until then he could always talk to Hermione in all the years they had attended Hogwarts. Now Harry felt just horrible, just like when Sirius had died during his fifth year.

Hermione avoided Harry as well. She did not blame him though and was still thankful for what he had sacrificed to protect her but she felt kind of uncomfortable talking to him. Her enslavement had really traumatized her and she was having nightmares every night where she was either having a heavy metal collar which was so heavy that she could not support its weight or her in reality hidden marking on her back placed on her forehead where it was perfectly visible. What all her nightmares had in common though was that she somehow always ended up being dragged by Draco into an empty class room while Harry was reaching out his hand but it was always just an inch too far away for her to touch it. While she was awake she spent most of her times studying as the final exams were 'only' two and a half months ahead. But she had not experienced such loneliness since her first year and after just a week she was back to skipping classes and crying in the girls' bathroom.

That was when Harry decided that the only result of them not talking is her having mental breakdowns and him just feeling horrible. He did not dare directly try to speak her about her feelings. After lunch he finally managed to confront her, "Hey Hermione. Can we talk for a second?" She nodded weakly and Harry noticed how tired she was. "You had said that you could train that mental connection between us?", Harry asked trying to ignore the fact that she probably was not quite ready to talk about anything concerning their bond. She nodded again. "Do you feel like we could start our training any time soon?", he asked trying to be as politely as possible. Hermione now noticed how anxious he was. She had not realized before that Harry felt just as bad about her enslavement as Hermione herself. Not wanting to hurt him she agreed "Yes, I think so. Should we start this evening? We could go to the Room of Requirement there we can work without being interrupted."

"Good idea. It will also provide us with the necessary books on mental connections. Let's 7 pm? Then we have about an hour before returning to the common room. If get the theory stuff covered in that time we could continue our work there practically. Well, we'll see." With his pulse twice as fast as usual he said goodbye and hurried to his dormitory since he had Transfiguration in ten minutes and he still needed to get his book and the essay that Trelawney had sat due for this lesson.

At 7 pm both were sitting at a desk in the Room of Requirement. The room now looked like an ordinary class room except that all books in there were about mental connections. Harry had arrived there half an hour early so Hermione would not have to explain everything to him as he was still afraid to disappoint her. When she arrived punctually at 7 pm Harry had a basic understanding of how their connection worked. She sat down and both exchanged what they knew about the connection. They summarized that during the bonding there magic had exchanged some of themselves which allowed there souls to build a connection. They could access this bridge by concentrating all there mental and magical power on the other while thinking of what they wanted the other to see. This included anything they could form into a thought.

Then they looked for practical advice and took the two books that seemed the most helpful and started taking notes. The most important exercise seemed to be meditation as both books called it 'the key to your soul'. While meditating you train your mind to focus the mental power on one specific thought. To focus your magical power Harry's book advised them to practice this in combination with wandless magic. Due to the lack of a wand you need to concentrate your magic by yourself which is usually the task of the wand. Even though most wizards and witches accomplish very little without their wand it is powerful enough for the connection as they interact on a pure spiritual basis without any impact on their physical surrounding.

Following the books recommendations they looked for instructions on meditation and wandless magic. It was a quarter to eight when they had collected all information they could find on these two topics. They used their last 15 minutes to work out a practice schedule for each of them. The schedule intended them to practice meditating for one hour every day before sleeping. Wandless magic they would learn before and after breakfast for a total of 30 minutes. Additionally they had arranged three meetings weekly where they talked about their progress and also started to actually communicate through the connection. In the beginning Harry struggled with meditating and often he lost his concentration. Hermione on the other hand had not much problems with concentrating since she was used to do so when she was studying. She had her problems with focusing her magical power. From time to time she did manage to levitate a feather but only for one a couple of seconds. Harry was able to do a lot of progress in that field. He too struggled at first as he did not understand how to focus his magic but he after a week he had advanced so far that he was able to let the feather fly around his head for more than a minute.

During their meetings it became clear that their daily practicing paid off. They started with sending visual thoughts through the connection as this was described as the easiest field in most books. At first the pictures they received from each other were really blurry and disappeared in under a second. But as they continued their training in meditation and wandless magic they were able to hold the connection for much longer and slowly the pictures became clearer. Also Harry was not disappointed since their discussions became less and less strained which was why Harry had initially started their training: to rebuild their friendship. The feeling of anxiety when he was alone with Hermione was quickly replaced with a relaxed and cheerful atmosphere. Regardless of what Harry had feared at first, that the bonding had ended their friendship, their relation actually grew stronger than it had been before.

After just a month they were already communicating their thoughts almost effortless and used the connection outside the meetings as well. Ron who had been in a relationship with Lavender Brown since Easter holidays got a bit annoyed as he had the feeling that they were talking behind his back as they both developed the habit to seemingly randomly start laughing when no one else could really tell why. When they asked them about it they always explained something on the lines of how they had seen Snape accidentally spill some wine on his toast. "How comes you two always see the same things?", he once confronted them in an annoyed tone. None of them had a an answer on that question so they just shrugged.

A slightly more pleasant side effect of their connection than Ron mistrusting them was them becoming quite skilled in wandless magic. Especially Harry who was very ambitious in that field had made huge progress. He was now able to perform most of the second year spells and was even trying some third year spells. Hermione too, even though she was not that ambitious, had made considerable progress. She had focused on the most useful charms like healing or summoning charms. Those were quite hard to pull off but she was now able to heal wounds just with one skilled hand movement. Another quite pleasant side effect was, at least for Harry, being able to follow the lessons with much less difficulty. He tended to drive off in the thoughts after just five to ten minutes which led him to having to guess most of what he was supposed to do as Ron had not paid attention either. Naturally he missed on most of the tips the teacher gave them leaving him far behind those who had listened. He suspected his meditation exercises being responsible for his improvements in class. If revising would be as easy as the classes he would have no problems at all with his finals.

Harry was heading from Divination to the Great Hall. In Divination too he had improved. Trelawney still was a fraud of course but Harry had decided to simply not pay attention to her and read what the book had to say on that subject since his Divination book had been written by an actual seer. Harry got this idea as Trelawney was talking about how everyone was a seer. Harry who at that moment did not believe at all that prophecies were much more then random magical messages received by humans suddenly remembered his practical exam in his third year. He was supposed to foresee the future in an crystal sphere. When he was supposed to tell the jury what he had seen he told them the first thing that came to his mind since he had not been able to find any sensible shape in the mist that was trapped in the sphere. But what he told him actually turned out to be a true prophecy: He had told them that he saw a Hippogriff flying in the sky. And later that day he was flying on Buckbeaks back rescuing his Godfather Sirius. Harry was convinced that if he had once made a prophecy he was able to foretell more. And with the help of the book he was sometimes able to foresee some events that would happen mostly in the next twelve hours. Last lesson he had predicted that Professor Sprout would get sick and it actually turned out to be true when they had one lesson less the next day.

But this Divination lesson he had seen something that was worrying him. Trying to reason with himself that there was no need to worry taking in account that he was still often making wrong prophecies he was suddenly pulled out of his thoughts.


	4. Chapter 4

**Chapter 4:**

Hermione was was calling for help through the connection. "What is it?", he asked but he received no answer. Don't panic, he thought to himself, panicking. He desperately tried to get an answer from her but he did not receive even the slightest thought. Deeply worried, he ran to where he sensed her with the bond's tracing charm. Then he realized where he was heading: The dungeons near the Slytherin common room. He drew his wand ready to fight. When he finally reached the room where he knew she was he put on his invisibility cloak and cast as silencing charm on himself. The door to the room was made of massive steal and had not even a keyhole. He could not simply enter as he probably could not fight all of them at once if Malfoy had asked for help and spying on whoever was inside proved to be impossible as there came out no sounds at all from that room. He did not have a choice but to get a teacher.

Or did he? He suddenly he remembered the vision he had had in Divination. He had seen himself fighting with one other person in a dark room. But they had not been not alone. There had been one person lying tied up unconscious on a desk while someone else was flying around Harry's opponent. The one person on the desk had to be Hermione. The other person had to be a ghost Harry concluded. Quickly he took off the cloak and disabled the silencing charm running towards the Great Hall where he hoped to find someone who could help him. He had barely run half a minute when he nearly collided with the Nearly Headless Nick, not that it would hurt or something but Harry thought of it as kind of impolite. "Harry! Why are you running?"

"I need you to help me please! Hermione has been kidnapped into one of the rooms with steel doors and I need to find out what is inside, please help me!" Without waiting for a response he ran back to the room where he still sensed Hermione. "Could you please carefully take a look and tell who's inside?", Harry asked hopefully. Nick carefully floated into the wall in front of them.

"There is only the Malfoy boy inside apart from her. But she has tied her on a table and she seems to be unconscious", he reported horrified when he returned.

"This git!", Harry exclaimed, "I have to stop him from whatever he wants to do!" And without hesitation he cast 'Alohomora' at the door which swung open immediately.

The fight started in the moment he open the door. Harry was dodging the spells and covering behind the door while firing spells at Draco who was being encircled by Nick. Harry needed protect Hermione before she is hit. He tried to rush to Hermione but in the last moment before he was fully in cover behind a desk he was hit by an Expelliarmus. Triumphant Draco laughed. "I guess I have two captives now. Any last words?", he sneered. But Harry was not close to being defeated. Having practiced wandless magic for the last five weeks or so he was well capable of fighting even without his wand. Quickly he cast a wandless Expelliarmus and caught Draco's wand while summoning his own wand which had landed on the floor. He swiftly stunned the totally confused Draco and hurried to Hermione.

He examined the manacles which held her on the desk. They had thorns on the inside that had torn themselves into her hand that were now covered in her own blood. Harry who was at the moment almost as pale as the Nearly Headless Nick made a few wand movements over them and carefully removed the fetters. He quickly healed her wounds to prevent further blood loss. "Enervate", he cast on her. She opened her eyes in terror and tried to get up but Harry softly held her down. "Don't get up immediately or you might pass out. You have lost a lot of blood."

"Hospital wing", she whispered. Harry picked her up and ran as quickly as he could to the hospital wing which was unfortunately on the other side of the castle. Nick floated ahead reporting what had happened to Professor McGonnagle when he saw her in an empty transfiguration class room. She hurried towards where Nick had told her Harry was. Hermione had fainted again and Harry was close to collapsing. When she saw them she cast a levitation charm on Hermione and told Harry to follow her.

When they arrived Madam Pomfrey had already been told about everything by Nick and had prepared a tablet of potions of which she hoped they could help Hermione. She cast a few analysis charms on Hermione and then poured a few selected potions down her throat. Frowning McGonnagle asked her what had happened when the door to the hospital wing opened. All became silent when Dumbledore entered.

"Poppy, what has happened to her?", he asked calmly but his worries were perfectly audible.

"She has been dosed with several potions: Sedation Potion, Lethargy Potion, Sleep Potion and if I'm not totally wrong a small amount of Liquid Pain. I had to put her in an awake state but she has temporally no control over her body. This is necessary to be able to deal with the syndromes that have occurred due to the large number of mostly not compatible potions. She will probably regain full health in under 24 hours. I would advise Mr Potter to stay here at least over the night as he seems to be physically exhausted to an unhealthy level. There are also several broken bones which I can mend immediately but personally I would prefer him to be here over the night just in case."

Harry considered for a moment since he felt a bit dizzy and had problems holding his balance.

"Mr Malfoy has been secured and will be questioned once everyone is fit again." , Dumbledore told Harry answering his question before he had formulated it.

"Okay, I'll stay here for the night", he said weakly collapsing onto his bed.

"Hermione?", he asked through their connection, "Are you okay?"

"Harry, what is this? Am I dead?", she asked with a trembling voice.

"It's okay, Hermione, you're still alive. You are temporally unable to use your body but you have regained consciousness. Malfoy had apparently fed you with so many incompatible potions that there had occurred some serious syndromes. I think it's best if I just show you what had happened. Okay?"

"Go ahead." He showed him everything from when he had heard her scream until he then. "Why didn't you respond?"

"I have no idea. I was just so tired."

"But what did he do to you?" She hesitated for a moment but then she send her point of view through the connection.

She was walking towards the Great Hall for lunch when she suddenly heard a voice. "Expelliarmus". She panicked. She turned around and saw that it was Malfoy. "Goodnight!", he said grinning triumphantly. She contacted Harry. She needed him to help her as quickly as possible to prevent Malfoy from doing whatever he planned to do. Then it was black. She was laying on a wooden surface. When she tried to move her legs she felt sharp thorns cutting into her flesh which made her scream. But she did not panic even the slightest. Sure, she had been abducted and was unable to defend herself but she did not see any reason to try and change something about that right now. "Now tell, what is your secret. Why are you meeting with Potter thrice a week in the Room of Requirement? You better tell me or I will have to use Legilimency to find out." Hermione knew she couldn't tell him or she would lose all the information about the bond and also lose the ability to use the mental connection so she kept silent. "Very well." He leaned over her and looked in her eyes. She closed her eyes in order to prevent him from entering her mind. "Open your eyes or I will make you do!", he screamed at her. He then forced her mouth open and poured down a liquid. "I wanted to do this anyway", he laughed. As soon as the potion entered her body she began screaming. An unbearable pain shot pulsing through her body. "Now open your eyes or I will make it worse", he threatened. She obliged terrified by the torture. She saw herself entering the Room of Requirement when she heard distant steps. Malfoy had had heard them too apparently as he stunned her. When she woke up again she still felt this pulsing pain and she felt gravely dehydrated. She tried to get up when she heard Harry's voice "Don't get up immediately or you might pass out. You have lost a lot of blood." He had healed the wounds where the thorns had forced themselves into her flesh. She needed medical help. God knows what Draco had dosed her with. "Hospital wing", she managed to whisper before she felt herself fainting again.

"That was close. He surely would have exposed us", Harry noted, "But why was he so suspicious in the first place?"

"I don't have a clue. For all he knows, we could have dating", she replied blushing slightly. There was a brief silence.

"We need to be more careful. And now that he has been caught the news will spread quickly. We definitely need a good cover story", Harry said to interrupt the awkward silence.

"I know. I think we should not meet for a while. Even if we get there unnoticed people will notice that we are not in the common room or in the library. Apart from that I think we don't really need to meet. I don't mean that we should have stopped anyway but we could communicate through the connection."

"Yeah, and I need to start learning for the finals. We only need to improve live communication of visuals. But we still need a cover story. Maybe we could really tell them that we had been dating and needed a quiet place?", he carefully suggested.

"Yeah we could do that", she agreed gladly since she had the idea herself but could not tell him about it. Even though they had not mentioned it since then, she still was by magic a slave to him and their relation to each other had been a taboo theme since then. There was a very long silence after that.

"I think I'm going to sleep now, Goodnight Hermione!"

"Goodnight Harry. I'm not sure if I am able to sleep in this state but I will try it", she chuckled.

When Harry woke up the next morning he quietly asked Hermione if she was awake. As he did not receive a response he decided not to wake her and quietly got dressed after receiving permission from Madam Pomfrey. It was about 7 am at a Saturday so he got down to the Great Hall where he might be able to eat without being asked too many questions if he was lucky. Then he remembered what Dumbledore had told him. There was going to be the questioning today. Harry was not sure what exactly he meant by that as they probably would not leave the school but Draco had still committed major crimes. As he arrived in the Great Hall he happily noticed that there were only a few Gryffindor first years and one Ravenclaw present. He quickly finished breakfast and just in the moment he was leaving the Great Hall he heard Hermione's voice, "Harry?"

"Hi Hermione", he replied, "You were able to get some sleep I see?"

"Yes, it took a while but in the end I succeeded. But more important, I'm fully awake now, so I can move my body and so on."

"That's great! How do you feel?", he asked avoiding to speak about the upcoming questioning.

"I'm okay. I think if it hadn't been for Malfoy's calming potion I would have died from fear yesterday. But I think it has worn off entirely now. Are you ready for the questioning? Madam Pomfrey told me that it probably would take place at 9 am today."

"Yeah I think so. Do you know what this questioning will like exactly?"

"I don't have a clue. But according to Madam Pomfrey it will be held in Dumbledore's office."

"I just hope they don't ask to many questions. Like, why had I been there in the first place? How did I know you were there? Why did I ran from the Divination Tower to the dungeons?"

"You could tell them that you had practiced the tracing charm the day before and forgot to deactivate it. And the rest was paranoia."

"Yeah, probably. I just hope Malfoy won't tell too much. He seemed to have a clue that we were not simply dating or studying. And I had to use wandless magic on him when he disarmed me."

"You actually disarmed him wandlessly? I thought I had missed out on something when you showed me your memory. Yes... this will be hard to cover up. Why would any student be that skilled in wandless magic? Honestly, I don't think that even among aurors there are many capable of disarming someone wandlessly. Maybe you could tell you had my wand? No, no, you didn't have my wand, they know since they found it in one of Malfoy's pockets."

"Is there any way to enchant an object to disarm someone else? Like Mr Weasely's flying car which cast a levitation charm on itself in order to fly", Harry suggested.

"Yes, I have read about these kind of charms some time ago. How much time have we got?", she asked.

"About one and a half hours."

"Let's go straight to the library, maybe we are able to create something like this. If we went to the Room of Requirement there might be people spying on us who have heard about our meetings from Malfoy."

The library was still empty when they entered. They were lucky as these books were available in the public section of the library but the spells they found were very complex. They chose a small stone as the weapon Harry supposedly had used. The instruction had them cast six different charms on it before they cast the spell the stone was supposed to perform on it. When they had finally succeeded with all six charms and the Expelliarmus they carefully tested it. Harry put pressure on the stone which began to heat up and then Hermione's wand flew out of her hand. Just as Hermione picked up her wand Dumbledore along with three other very formally dressed men entered the library. Quickly Harry put the stone in his pocket and switched the book with one on the ancient goblin revolutions. They had not seen them yet and Harry along with Hermione who had also pulled out a book on goblin revolutions seemed deeply absorbed into their books. A moment later Dumbledore noticed them and walked up to them. "Good morning Harry, Good morning Hermione, I see you are all fit again. As you might have deduced, I and the three ministry employees are here because of the questioning. It will be held at 9 am today in my office. Each of you will be questioned separately. Any questions?"

"No, sir", Harry replied.

"Then I will see you in my office", he said smiling kindly when he left along with the three ministry employees.

Hermione was questioned first. "Hello Hermione. Sit down." Dumbledore was sitting at his desk gesturing to the chair in front of it. The three ministry employees sat at desks that they had apparently brought themselves. "I am going to ask you some questions. You do not have to answer them if you do not want to but I would highly encourage to give us as many information as you can. Is everything clear?" She nodded. "Then let us begin. Where were you when Mr Malfoy abducted you?" There were a lot of simple question which Hermione all answered truthfully. Looking onto his notes Dumbledore cleared his throat, "Do you know or have an idea how Harry found you?"

"We had practiced tracing charms the day before. He probably forgot to lift the charm, sir", she lied. Dumbledore did not seem to notice as he continued, "What did you do during the mentioned meetings? Remember you do not have to answer if you do not want to."

"Harry and I are dating, sir", she said blushing.

"I think that I asked all my questions." He turned to the three ministry employees and they nodded. Upon that Hermione got up and left the room. When Harry saw her leaving the office he knew it was his turn. She wished him good luck and he entered.

Dumbledore now too gestured Harry to sit down and explained him, that he had not had to answer. He started again with the simple questions. After Harry had told him how he had told the Nearly Headless Nick to take a look through the wall Dumbledore asked him, "How did you know in the first place where and that Hermione had been abducted?"

"Hermione and me had been practicing tracing charms the day before, sir. I must have forgotten disable it."

"And why were you so sure that she had been abducted? After all, the class room where she had been was right on the way between the Great Hall and her Runes class room."

"In Divination I had had a vision of me fighting someone in dark room with a ghost encircling my opponent and someone lying tied up on a desk. And then I remembered that I have had some prophecies before that turned out to be true. Upon that I simply panicked." It was not what Hermione had told him to tell Dumbledore as they had not noticed that there would be this problem. In fact, Harry had not even told Hermione about the vision because he knew Hermione did not believe in Divination but Dumbledore already seemed suspicious for some reason so he swiftly decided to tell him about the prophecy.

Dumbledore seemed to think for a moment before he went on, "In the fight with Mr Malfoy he had disarmed you he told us. Yet you were still able to disarm him. What did you do?"

"I have an enchanted stone which is able to cast an Expelliarmus. I quickly pulled it out of my pocket when I was disarmed and then I used it against him, sir. With his wand I stunned him."

"Could you show us this stone?" Harry pulled out the stone from his pocket and showed it to Dumbledore. "Would you mind to demonstrate it? You can use it on me", he offered picking up his wand. Harry directed the stone at Dumbledore and put pressure on it. The stone heated up and after a second Dumbledore's wand flew out of his hand. Suppressing his shock Dumbledore congratulated, "Very impressive. Where did you get it from?"

"It was a gift from Hermione. She thought it could be of use for me." Apparently they had done some very advanced magic as Dumbledore again seemed very impressed.

After a while he continued, "Madam Pomfrey told us that there were no wounds on her wrists and feet even though they were covered in blood as well as the manacles which have sharp thorns on where they came in contact with Hermione. Can you explain that?"

"I healed the wounds to prevent further blood loss, sir." Again Dumbledore seemed impressed but he did not comment on it this time.

"One last question. What did you do during your meetings with Hermione in the Room of Requirement? Don't worry, Hermione is okay with you telling us as she has already told us. We would just like a confirmation from you", he assured Harry. Blushing he confirmed, "Yes, sir, we are dating."

"Well, I don't think I have any more questions to you right now. If you three do not have any either, you may leave, Harry" The three ministry employees shook their heads. Saying Goodbye to all four Harry left the office.

Outside he met Hermione who had been waiting for him. "It's all okay I think. They became suspicious as the room was located on the way between the Runes class room and the Great Hall which made it obvious that I did know more than I had told them that I did. I'm sorry, Hermione. There is something I haven't told you about. During Divination I made a prophecy. It basically showed the scene of me fighting Malfoy in that room. I did not tell you about it because I thought you would make fun of me. Well, I had to tell them about it as an excuse to why I suspected that there was something wrong with you." With a feeling of guilt Hermione replied sadly, "Harry, you can tell me everything. I would never make fun of you if you seem to take whatever it is seriously. Please don't think of me like that"

"I'm sorry, Hermione, I didn't mean it like that. I just wanted to say..."

"It's okay. But there seems to be a misconception. I do believe in prophecies. I just don't think Trelawney is able to foresee even what she's going to eat for dinner. Do have those visions frequently?"

"No, this was the biggest one so far. I found out that with the help of the book and some practise this subject can actually be of use. I've had only highly prophecies that were fulfilled in the next couple of days but I think I'm making progress."

"Now I regret having dropped out of Divination class. But keep your work up and tell me if you foresee something important."

They anticipated the announcement of Malfoy's punishment but during the next weeks they did not hear anything about him. They did not see him anywhere though which meant that he was at least suspended. They spent most of their free time revising for the finals. The news that they were dating traveled fast and no one could really tell where it originated. At least they could spent some time together that way without having people spreading weird rumors. As he had anticipated Harry had much less trouble while studying for the finals. When they were about to take their exams Harry felt as prepared as he had ever been. He was not able to convince Hermione to let him ask her some questions if he was unsure about some dates or names but it turns out that he did pretty well on his own. The most surprising exam was potions though. He had gotten used to doing a much better job with his brewing in the practical exams than with Snape swooping around his cauldron but this year he was almost worried when he brewed the potions without any difficulty. Sure, his daily meditation had helped him during class as well since brewing potions is mostly about being able to concentrate but now he felt like the Half-Blood-Prince himself.

But there was still one thing worrying him. In his practical Divination he saw something very clearly in the crystal ball. It was himself running away from a group of nine persons with bright red hair, throwing curses at him. He had talked with Hermione about it and she told him not to worry about it for it was probably a false prophecy and he had agreed with her. But even in Divination there was nothing that was simply wrong without a reason. He had prepared the crystal ball one-hundred percent correctly and the image was so clear that there was very little space for misinterpretation. And the fact that Harry had made in the past month only one single false prophecy was nothing to calm him down.

Deep down both knew what he had seen and they could not deny it: the result of the Weaselys finding out about the bond.


	5. Chapter 5

**Chapter 5:**

Harry's holidays at the Dursleys turned out to be at least a bit less awful than they had been before. He could not perform magic but he could persuade the Dursleys to let him keep his school books in his room instead of having them locked away. He was chatting a lot with Hermione and wrote also a lot of letters to Ron since he felt guilty for having spent much less time with him during the past months. But then again, Ron himself had been spending most of his time with his girlfriend Lavender. Harry was a bit annoyed that he could not practice wandless magic or anything in general that involved magic but he found at the end of his Divination textbook a chapter on tool-free foreseeing. So after he had finished all his homework he spent most of his time studying the theory, practicing tool-free Divination, chatting with his friends and meditating. He quickly noticed that he could not study fifteen hours without a break so he added physical workouts to his daily routine.

After two and a half weeks he had seen the Dursleys in total no more then 6 hours. He only left his room to go to the bathroom, to do his workout outside and for the meals. Due to his intense routine he gained not only a lot of muscles but also made considerable progress in tool-free Divination. At first it was very frustrating because Harry did not even have an idea what the book meant with "spreading your magic". Now he was able to catch some bits of information from time to time. These did not only include images but also audio content, physical sensations and emotions. Mostly he received emotive messages but he also caught some brief physical sensations and audio messages. Visuals were very rare and mostly only a bunch of colors. He was actually kind of glad to not receive clear visions for he was still worried about the Weasely vision and did not want to receive anything to confirm it. But he did not get very lucky in that point as he received brief shouts and emotive messages conveying fear from time to time. Even the small visuals he received contained always bright red parts. When he told Hermione about it she tried to soothe him, that it may be just a coincidence.

Some time in the third week of the holidays he received a small note from Ron's owl "Do you want to come to the burrow? We got the permission from Dumbledore. If yes just send the owl back without a note. We'll be here tomorrow at 11 am. Don't worry, we won't use the floo network." He instantly asked Hermione for advice, "Have you got an invitation to the Burrow too?"

"Yes, it just arrived. Harry, you can't isolate yourself from the Weaselys just because of one prophecy. Apart from that, if it was correct you could not do anything about it anyway."

"I know, I know. I'm just afraid. Anyway, a break from studying would probably do well too." With that he attached the note back to Pig who understood and flew out of the window. At dinner Harry briefly announced his departure which made Vernon turn to a dark shade of purple, "But they're not gonna get inside the house, is that understood?"

"Yes, I will tell them." This evening he packed all his stuff into his trunk. He told Hedwig who was just about to take a flight, "If you want to, you can fly to the Weasleys, I will get there tomorrow." The owl nodded and took off into the night.

The next morning after breakfast Harry sat in his room looking out of the window. He had brought his trunk and Hedwig's empty cage in the hallway and was ready to leave. A few minutes to 11 am the Weasleys came walking around the corner. Quickly Harry ran down the stairs. He said Goodbye to the Dursleys, took his trunk and the cage and stepped outside. Upon seeing him the Weasleys hurried toward him helping him with the baggage. "Harry! It's good to see you!", Mrs Weasley exclaimed hugging him.

"Calm down mum, or you will squeeze him to death", laughed Fred.

"Were they okay?", asked Ron emerging from the crowd of Weasleys.

"They were okay. But I didn't have to talk to them that much fortunately."

"Hello Harry. We apparated here. But you are still going to Hogwarts so I will side-by-side apparate with you once we get to Mrs Figgs", Mr Weasley explained. "Let's get going then!" After walking for a minute they knocked at Mrs Figgs door. "Harry, my dear. We haven't met for a while. How are you?", Mrs Figg asked as she answered the door.

"I'm fine, thanks." Once inside, they started disapparating so Mr Weasley took Harry's arm and they disappeared as well.

Harry spent most of his time at the Burrow with Ron and Hermione who Mr Weasley had picked up a few minutes later. They helped Mrs Weasley in the kitchen and with the garden. Harry studied a few hours a day, practiced Divination and also meditated but in first place he enjoyed being with Ron and Hermione. One Sunday Mrs Weasley had invited Fred, George, Percy, Charlie and Bill for dinner. They spent three hours preparing the meal for a total of eleven persons. Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny wished they was already out of Hogwarts so they would not have to do everything by hand. At half past six everything was ready and they placed the plates and bowls on the tables Mr Weasley had placed outside. It was still warm and the sun was shining warmly at the Burrow when they saw three owls flying over the forest toward them. "Those have to be the exam results!", exclaimed Hermione excited. When she took the letter from the owl that had landed beside her she looked confused. "Gin, that's for you! But then where is mine?"

"I dunno, we have only our own letters", Ron replied shrugging.

"I have to go to the ministry anyway in the next few days so I can ask them if they know something about it", suggested Mr Weasley relaxed.

"What has the Ministry got to do with that?", Ron asked him.

"If you dropped out of Hogwarts after your sixth year you can get a certificate from the ministry which contains the sixth year grades. But it occurs very rarely that this is the case because it doesn't make much sense to drop out before your final year. But yes, the sixth year exams are coordinated by the ministry", Hermione explained.

"Anyway, what grades do you three got? And how many O.W.L.s do you have, Gin?"

"I have four O's : Charms, DADA, History and Divination."

"In Charms and Herbology I got 'Outstanding', in History and Potions I have 'Average' and the rest is all 'Exceeds Expectations'", read out Ron. Blushing slightly Harry read out, "In Divination I have 'Exceeds Expectations' and the rest is 'Outstanding'."

"Hermione, you have a bad influence on him. Nearly all O's...", George mused disappointedly.

"Fred!", exclaimed Mrs Weasley.

"Yes?", answered the real Fred. Acting displeased George demanded, "Are you going to tell us that you still can't tell us apart. I am very disappointed in you." All laughed meanwhile a fourth owl arrived. It landed on Hermione lap where she took the letter, "Finally. Let's see."

"All 'Outstanding' I guess?", Ron asked laughing. She nodded smiling. But then her smile faded. Folding up her the envelope and stuffing it into her pocket she said sadly, "Now I can no longer improve."

"Merlin, I wish I had your problems", Ginny laughed.

"Now, let's enjoy the meal before it gets cold", Mrs Weasley said and with that everyone filled their plates. Soon there started multiple conversation; Ginny talked with Fred and George about their business while Ron, Charlie, Bill and Mr Weasley got into a discussion about Quidditch and Percy told Mrs Weasley about his upcoming promotion. Only Harry and Hermione did not seem to be interested in the conversations. Harry had noticed that Hermione looked extremely pale. "Is something wrong Hermione?", he asked through the connection. She answered with an image of the envelope. Harry instantly went as pale as Hermione. The envelope did not address her as "Ms Granger". It said unmistakable "Slave Granger-Potter".

"How do they know? There is no way that someone has told them about it even if someone had found out because it is simply not possible to talk about anything that has to do with that spell", Harry whispered through the connection.

"Harry, this isn't just some tradition. This is a magical bond, just like a marriage."

"Does that mean everyone could potentially know about it?"

"I don't think so. I don't hope so. I suspect that the ministry has access to your magical status. Even though there other ways to detect a bond, like a magical blood test, none of them could really be used without our knowledge."

"We need to request to keep it a secret. As soon as possible, or people like Malfoy might find out that way", Harry decided.

"Harry!", Hermione suddenly exclaimed, "Arthur is working at the ministry. They will surely tell him about it if they have noticed since they know that he knows me."

"And they have noticed", added Harry gravely, "I don't think it was a coincident that your owl was delayed."

"Harry... I hate to say that but I tend to think your prophecy was correct."

"Hermione. If that happens they will surely side with you. I did not see you running away so you should be fine. I know you don't want anyone to know about it but if this actually happens you need to persuade them to not tell anyone else about it. They will surely understand that this was the better option because exposing your status won't do anything but humiliating you."

"But Harry. They will hate you. They will do everything to harm you and your reputation. And they still are influential even though they are not rich. They are after all one of the oldest wizarding families."

"I know. I will have to try and explain myself. And if I fail, well, I guess I will have to live my life as a muggle or in isolation. Anyway, we need to go as quickly as possible to the ministry and do the request. I suggest directly tomorrow. We can tell them that we had a date somewhere in London", he suggested. Both blushed avoiding eye contact. Suddenly Harry deduced something. "Hermione. I think it's already too late. I saw nine Weasleys in the prophecy. Percy is going to leave tonight, he announced. There is no way they will let us leave the house this late and even if, most offices in the ministry are closed by the time we arrive there." Hermione was speechless. She had just accepted that the Weasleys were eventually going to find out, but tonight? That was too much for her. She excused herself and went to the bathroom, crying. Why did they have such a bad luck? And would she ever be able to see Harry again when they find out? Merlin, was it even legal to enslave her, even if she ordered him to? He was going to be locked up in Azkaban suffering into insanity an eventually death. Then she heard shouts outside and her heart missed a beat.

While Hermione had went inside another owl had arrived. The letter was addressed to Mr Weasley. When he finished reading during which he turned to a dark shade of red he started screaming, "HOW DARE YOU ENSLAVE HERMIONE! SHE HAS SAVED YOUR LIFE SEVERAL TIMES, SHE WAS YOUR FRIEND AND YOU MAKE HER A SLAVE? WE HAVE TREATED YOU LIKE OUR EIGHTH CHILD AND YOU DO THIS! HOW CAN YOU POSSIBLY THINK THAT WAS THE RIGHT THING TO DO? I DON'T KNOW HOW YOU GOT THE IDEA AND I DON'T WANT TO HEAR IT! A SLAVE! YOU ARE NEVER GOING TO CONTACT ANY MEMBER OF THE WEASLEY FAMILY AGAIN AND IF YOU DARE EVEN LOOK AT HERMIONE I WILL COME PERSONALLY TO YOUR CELL IN AZKABAN AND KILL YOU! DATING YOU SAY? THEN WHAT HAVE YOU DONE IN YOUR 'MEETINGS' WITH HERMIONE? RAPED HER! AND THEN TOLD HER TO SAY YOU WERE DATING! I CAN'T BELIEVE IT BUT MALFOY IS A BETTER MAN THAN YOU!"

"Mr Weasley, you need to hear me out!" Harry who had never seen Mr Weasley that angry was close to tears. He had expected the reaction but he simply could not stand, seeing this man, whom he had respected so much, screaming at him. Through the connection Harry told Hermione with a trembling voice, "Stay inside!" before Mr Weasley drew his wand. "NO I WON'T HEAR YOU OUT! HOW DARE YOU EVEN TALK TO ME!"

At that he started the fire. Harry did not have time to pull out his wand so he had to reflect Mr Weasley first spell wandlessly. Then he just started to run. He did not want to be there anymore, he wanted to be somewhere safe, somewhere where he could live without any worries. Now all Weasleys were firing spells at him and still could not he his wand out of his pocket. He had avoided the spells only barely and he knew he could not stand the rain of curses much longer. He needed to get to the fence where he hoped their Anti-appartion charm would stop working. He heard the shouted incarnations behind him in shock. While Bill and Mr Weasley merely shouted "Petrificus totalus" He heard much worse from the others. "Sectum Sempra" and even the Cruciatus curse were two of the many dark curses shooting toward him. Just as he was about to pull out his wand he got hit by something. It must have been the Cruciatus curse since he felt pain shooting through his entire body. Harry fell to the ground where he was hit by the body binding curse. After what felt like an eternity the Cruciatus curse finally stopped. He saw Ron standing besides him kicking him hard in the face and Ginny spitting on him. He would die if he did not do anything. He then did something very risky: he disapparated wandlessly.

He was surprised that he was not splinched when he landed in the forest where the Quidditch world cup took place. After he removed the body binding curse he finally managed to get out his wand which had been stuck in his pocket and healed his wounds. Harry was shocked. He had expected the Weasleys to get angry but the Cruciatus curse? He had expected that they would just try to prevent his flight but that they actually would harm him was shocking. Taking into account how they had reacted he thought that he would have a hard time getting to explain himself. Now he had to put all his hope into Hermione. Once he had healed his wounds he had to sit down, crying. He had just lost everything, how was he going to live on?

Meanwhile at the Burrow the Weasleys were left in deep confusion. "Where is he?", Ron shouted angrily.

"He must have disapparated!"

"How? He did not have his wand in his hand and he was petrified. It must have been a portkey!"

"Why would he have a portkey that would activate now?"

"That doesn't matter, we need to look after Hermione", said Bill finally. They hurried inside. "Hermione?", Ron called. "Hermione, can we please talk?" Hermione had hurried outside when she heard the shouts but when Harry started screaming it was too much for her. It was awful seeing his best friend being tortured by her other friends. She was relieved when she understood from their confusion that he had somehow escaped even though she did not know how. Crying she ran up to Ginny's room where she had always slept. She wanted to leave and go to Harry but she knew he needed her here. "Hermione, are you here?", Ginny called running to her room. "Hermione, are you okay? He is gone. Sorry, we don't know how he could escape, he was petrified and did not even touch his wand. At least Mom hit him with a Cruciatus curse. The aurors have already been alarmed by the ministry and are looking for him. But unfortunately they are not allowed to talk to anyone who they are chasing. And why they don't even know I think." Hermione had not been listening as she continued her crying but suddenly she looked up. She needed to warn him. "Harry!", she called through the connection, "The Aurors are looking for you. Please be careful and don't try fighting them!" She received a quiet "Thanks".

"Is everything okay with you? Do you need medical check-up?", Ginny offered.

"Please don't tell anyone. Please." Mr Weasley had entered the room. Hermione cringed realizing that they had let her hold the Cruciatus curse on Harry for almost a minute.

"Don't worry. We are the only ones apart the ministry employee who told me about it to know about it. He had to put a magical oath on keeping every data about any witch or wizard a secret. He could only tell me because I am your magical guardian. Don't worry, I have told him already to not tell your parents without your permission." Hermione was relieved. Now she had one worry less.

"But I insist on letting you be checked up at St Mungos", he added gravely. "Mr Weasley, it is not as you think it is. He never abused me, not even touched me."

"Hermione, as much as I want to believe you, I am sure that he has forbidden you to say anything else." She wanted to argue but she was way too tired and exhausted. "Let's go there immediately", he said reaching her hand and disapparating. Hermione did not want to be angry at him for he just wanted her best and it was all quite logical from his point of view but she felt her blood rushing when he implied what Harry might have done to her. They were in the waiting area of St Mungos which apparently had no apparition protection. "Wait here, I'll be back in a minute." When Mr Weasley returned from the talking to the receptionist he said, "We can stay here in the ground floor. We have our appointment in a few minutes." When the receptionist called "Ms Granger" Mr Weasley led her to the third room on the left. A young female healer was waiting for her inside.

"Hello, I am Ms Clearwater. I am told to check her through because of a confidential event that you cannot tell me. Is that correct?", she asked friendly. Mr Weasley nodded. "Are there any known issues?" Hermione shook her head. "Please lay down", she said, "I will do some basic analysis charms on you to see if there is anything wrong. Is there anything where I should take a closer look on?"

"Can we discuss this outside please?", asked Mr Weasley. As they went outside Hermione used the time to contact Harry.

"Harry. Mr Weasley took me to St Mungos to check me through. What do I do now? They will surely find out and the news will travel very fast from there on."

"Ask them for...", Harry began distractedly, "Ask them for secrecy. Healers are required to keep it to themselves if..." He trailed off again, "If you ask for it."

"Harry is everything okay? You seem to be busy with something else?"

"I- I'm fine."

The healer who now looked a bit distraught and Mr Weasley returned.

"Ms Clearwater, can I have the confirmation that you won't tell anyone about what you might find out in your check?"

"I am not going to tell a single soul." Relaxed Hermione lay down. She did multiple short spells on her noting the results in between. After five minutes she put her wand back. "Now. There are traces of cuttings in at her wrist and above her feet which have been healed by spells. Then there are signs of a few older unidentifiable potions and a small dose of the potion 'Liquid Pain'. But apart from that everything seems fine: No other signs of injuries, no other potions, active or not and... her virginity is untouched."

In the meantime Harry was facing a problem: he could not use magic. At least not until tomorrow which was his seventeenth birthday. If he were to use magic now the ministry would instantly now where he is and he would have to flee from a bunch of Aurors. But then he realized: he already had used magic. He had healed his wounds. He was about climb a tree to hide from the Aurors when he suddenly heard six cracks. That had to be them. He climbed the tree a few meters trying to be as silent as possible. He when he reached a good branch he pulled out his wand so he would be able to defend himself. The Aurors had spread throughout the forest. That was when Hermione called him. That was not the best moment for her to talk with him but he did not tell her about the situation so she would not be worried. The Aurors did not seem to have noticed him as they walked past his tree pushing aside some leaves apparently looking for a hiding places underground. After two hours the Aurors met once again a few meters away from Harry's tree. He had been holding onto this branch for over two hours now and he slowly got tired. He was sure that if he had not worked out at the Dursley's he would have fallen off the branch. After having a brief whispered discussion they six Aurors disapparated. Harry climbed back onto the ground where he walked for half an hour through the darkness. Sure enough that the Aurors would not look for him here in the next two hours Harry sat down.

When Hermione returned from St Mungos all seem very curious though they tried to not let it show. In a whispered tone Mrs Weasley asked, "Is she okay? He did not.. did he?"

"No, no, not that. But she had been tortured. The healer found spell-healed cutting wounds on her wrists and above her feet. And she found a small dose of 'Liquid Pain' in her", Mr Weasley whispered to her so that only she could understand.

"This bastard! How could he? Torturing her. For fun. Someone entirely helpless. He will pay for that! In Azkaban!", she hissed. Hermione had initially planned on waiting until tomorrow to start her attempts to convince him of the truth but he could no longer stand it, letting them insult Harry so mercilessly. "Mr Weasley, I need to discuss something with you. Can we have some privacy?", she asked. They went into the empty kitchen and sat down.

"What is it Hermione?"

"Mr Weasley. You have a completely wrong idea of the whole situation. I want to tell you how it really happened. She then started telling him everything that had happened paying attention to not breaking the taboo. Mr Weasley who had listened closely was not convinced though, "If that had actually happened, you could have informed a teacher. They would have to do something with that much evidence for Draco's plan and its severity."

"Mr Weasley, there is something I did not tell you about and I won't even though I preferred to do so. I highly recommend you to inform yourself upon this topic."

"So there is something that explains why you did not talk to a teacher and you can't tell me what it is?" She nodded. "Now you recommend me to inform myself on that topic. But where would I find something about that? I can't use the books from the Hogwarts library, it would cause too much disturbance if I demanded a book filled with dark magic. Flourish and Blotts don't sell any book that contains magic even close to being that dark. That only leaves me with some shady shops in the Nocturne Alley where I would never even set my foot in." He considered for a moment. "And Potter knows that. It all fits. He told you to tell me this story to get out of this situation. The story was almost perfect, except for one little problem. This problem he covers up by letting you tell me that can't state your reason. But you give me an advice on how to find out about it to make it more subtle. This advice though, is not an advice. I cannot do what you recommend me making it hard for me to not believe you. He tried to use my faith to talk himself out of the situation." Hermione felt hopeless. How was she ever going to prove she had free will, that she was telling the truth? "I'm sorry Hermione, we will get you out of his control. Until then we will keep you safe."


	6. Chapter 6

**Chapter 6:**

After her total failure of trying to convince Mr Weasley she went to bed. She did not want to know how Harry was feeling at the moment for she was responsible for the situation. She probably would have killed herself if she had not cared about Harry so much. After almost three months she had another breakdown. This was worse than she had ever expected it to be. Why was Mr Weasley so convinced that Harry was controlling her, that Harry was the bad guy? It had literally been confirmed that she was still a virgin and all evidence leads to the conclusion that Harry was innocent. They had known Harry for five years now, just last year he had saved Mr Weasley from being killed by Nagini, he had even saved her in his first year from the troll and he would have saved her again in his second task of the Triwizard tournament. How could Mr Weasley possibly think that Harry would ever do something to her? She felt horrible. Not only had he lost his only real family he ever had but he was now also wanted by Aurors and was on the run. Then she suddenly remembered. He had seemed so distracted when she was in St Mungos. He must have been attacked by Aurors and did not tell her so she would not worry about him. He could have been captured by now. Already in court. In Azkaban. Or dead.

"Harry?", she called worried.

"Yes?", he replied subdued.

"I was just so worried. Have you been attacked? When I talked to you the last time you seemed to be distracted by something."

"No, I'm fine. Really. There were Aurors but they did not find me. Anyway, in a few hours I'll turn seventeen and I can perform magic undetected. I think I am going to try and build a small cabin and put it under the Fidelius charm. I learned at least the theory while studying at the Dursleys. What did happen after I left?"

"As I told you, they had me checked through at St Mungos. They did not find anything but the traces from Malfoy's abduction. I tried to talk to Mr Weasley. I have told him everything that happened but he still seemed to be convinced that you are the bad guy." She continued telling him how Mr Weasley interpreted her telling the story. Harry concluded, "We need to find a way to either get him the books so he can find out about the taboo or we need to prove that I am not controlling you. But for the latter I would have to visit them which would probably result in them killing me."

They tried to come up with a plan but neither of both was capable of conjuring a reasonable thought so they gave up on it and Hermione went to sleep. Harry who did not want to risk being attacked by Aurors stayed awake until dawn. Being sure that he was off age now he first apparated to another place to hide. Hermione would heavily criticize him for choosing this place but he needed the view. He had chosen one of the mountains that surrounded Hogwarts. He did not really risk anything since if he put his cabin under Fidelious charm no one would be able to find him anyway. So he started building his cabin. He magically chopped down a few trees and transformed the logs into planks. He built a simple room by stacking the planks onto each other and magically stabilizing them.

When he was done he started with the Fidelius charm. To check if it had worked he told Hermione beforehand where he had built the cabin which made her express her worries about the decision. He could convince her though that with the Fidelius charm there would be no way of discovering his hiding place anyway. Then he concentrated for a moment before he drew his wand and cast the Fidelius charm. He covered the whole plateau so he would not have to hide in his cabin all day. When he finished the incarnation a blue light emerged out of his wand and formed a huge sphere on the plateau. It stayed for a moment before it slowly faded and became invisible. He was quite sure that he had succeeded he asked Hermione, "Hermione, where have I built my cabin?"

"Uhm... No, I don't know. Harry, you should also cast other protection charms especially the general human repelling charm."

"I know, I know. By the way, my cabin is on the second highest mountain of those which surround the Hogwarts castle."

"Ah, yes I remember", she said in a criticizing tone and both laughed. Harry then continued with his protection charms. He walked over to his cabin. "This could be a bit larger", he thought to himself and cast an extension charm on it. He now had a four story house even with a garden with an artificial sky which he added later. He spent the next few hours transfiguring stones and branches into furniture. At about twelve o'clock Harry was very content with his 'cabin' and told Hermione that he will get some sleep now which he had not had for over twenty-four hours.

At the burrow the situation was strained. During breakfast there were a lot of awkward silences and nobody looked at Hermione. She was really annoyed by this. Did they think she might attack them if they talk to her because she was under Harry's control? But that left Hermione with some time to think about a plan. She needed to act quickly because if Harry would not have been deemed innocent before the start of the term he would not be able to return to Hogwarts which would lead to a great chaos. That meant they had four weeks left. It would be easy to buy the book on enslavement charms by post delivery and than give it to Mr Weasley but she was not sure if that was banned by the taboo because she was essentially pretty much directly giving him the information on slave bond. And she did not want to be obliviated on all of that as it would complicate the situation even further. No, she needed to find a way to prove his innocence without risking her or him to do something banned. Quickly she realized giving him the book without breaking the taboo was basically impossible. The only possibility she could think of was ordering a third person who did not know about her status to give the book to Mr Weasley. But that made both her and Mr Weasley highly suspicious. So she thought of a way to prove she was telling the truth. Instantly Veritaserum came to her mind. But how would she get it and at the same time prove that it was real? Sure, she could let him test it on someone else but he probably did not trust her enough for that. And then there was another problem with Veritaserum: She could not use it on herself because if she had her memories altered, how they insist she had, she would still not tell the truth. To really prove Harry's innocence, he would have to drink it. And more than that, Harry and the Weasleys would have to meet each other. She needed to discuss this with Harry first.

After breakfast Mr Weasley pulled her aside. "Hermione, I have thought of something. I, too, am not very happy with this situation and would be delighted to have the proof that it all happened as you said. Therefore I think Harry and me should have a talk and discuss how we are going to handle the situation."

"I have thought of a way to prove Harry's innocence. But I don't know what he thinks of it. We could use Veritaserum on him. That would ultimately give us the truth."

"Yes, I have thought of it too. In fact, I have told a coworker in the ministry to get me a little dose of it. We will of course first have to ask for his permission. If you don't have any objections I will send him an owl. It should find him wherever he is hiding."

"Yes, I think would be fine with this."

"Harry?"

"Yes?"

"Harry, Mr Weasley is going to send you a letter. He asks you to meet him in it. He told me that he has Veritaserum. Would that be an option for you?"

"Yeah probably. I mean he can't poison me, it would get himself in trouble. And there is nothing that I'm hiding. Okay, there are some embarrassing things that I would prefer to keep secret but I think that's worth it."

When the owl arrived Harry quickly read the letter which suggested him to come over this day at three pm. He picked a sheet of paper and wrote his response on it and sent it back with the owl. A few minutes to three he disapparated to the burrow. From this evening on he would be able to properly enjoy his holidays, without worries about being exposed or imprisoned in Azkaban. He went thus went to the front door and knocked. Mr Weasley opened the door with one hand, the other hand tightly holding his wand, "I am going to give you a few drops of Veritaserum. Hermione and I will be the only one to question you. We will only ask you to tell us how it came that Hermione is your slave." They went into the empty living room.

"Where is Hermione?", asked Harry. In this moment he saw something moving behind the armchair. Quickly he drew his wand. He cast a disillusionment charm on himself rendering him perfectly invisible. "Harry what are you doing? There are no Aurors here!"

At this Harry knew it was a trap and informed Hermione through the connection, "Hermione, it's a trap, there are Aurors here!"

"Don't attack! I will get down and help you!" Harry heard steps above him.

"Hermione, I'm invisible. Try to distract him so I can leave in the meantime."

Hermione had entered the living room. "Is he here? I heard Harry's voices!"

"Yes he is here but-"

At this he stopped. Outside the house there was a bright flash. Hermione hurried out side. Harry was now visible again while he was fighting to Aurors. As Mr Weasley followed her outside he stunned the one to left wandlessly while blocking a curse from the other one. A quick stunner followed and both aurors were unconscious. Suddenly Mr Weasley fired a Disarming spell at Harry whose wand now came soaring toward Mr Weasley. Harry reacted quickly wandlessly summoning his wand back into his hand while dodging a stunner that a third auror had launched at him. Hermione had stunned Mr Weasley the moment he had disarmed Harry and was now firing stunners at the third Auror. Before he could react, the Auror was hit. "There is at least one left in the house", he shouted before he saw that Hermione had been knocked out. Quickly he hurried toward her but before he could help her he was hit from above. Ginny had watched the whole scene. As she saw that they were losing she sent two stunners at Hermione and Harry. The auror that had been hiding behind the armchair hurried out of the house grinning. "Now let's get to the ministry", he said while waking up the other Aurors and Mr Weasley. They grabbed Harry, walked outside the apparition protected area and disapparated leaving Hermione lying unconscious beside the door.

When Harry reopened his eyes he found himself tied to a chair in the center of the courtroom where he had already been questioned two years earlier about the Patronus he had cast in order to fend off the Dementors at Little Whinging. But then he had not been tied to that chair. Harry noted with relieve that the room was almost empty. There were a total of six persons present: The judge, whom he did not recognize, four jurors and Mr Weasley. He wanted to tell Hermione but the judge started talking as he saw that had been woken. "You have been charged with non-consensual enslavement of Miss Hermione Granger. To make it a bit quicker: Are there any objections?"

"Ehm yes. It was consensual."

"Explain." Once more Harry told how he ended up enslaving Hermione carefully avoid to actually talk about the bond, thus not breaking the taboo. "If this was the truth, there would not be any legal consequences but can you prove it?"

"There are no witnesses, but I am willing to repeat my statement under the influence of Veritaserum."

The judge frowned at him. "Well, assistant, get him drink the veritaserum." He seemed annoyed. One young woman, whom Harry had not noticed so far grabbed something from beneath the desk. It was a small bottle with a pipette. She went down to Harry and ordered him to open his mouth. She then filled the pipette with Veritaserum and put a few drops on Harry's tongue. The judge went on grinning evilly, "Then repeat your story now." Harry felt himself answering and telling the judge everything once more. At this Mr Weasley went to the judge and whispered something to him.

"I am asked to let you tell us what you did with Miss Granger since her enslavement. Do you want to answer this question?"

"Yes, I want to." The judge repeated the question, "What did you do with Miss Granger since her enslavement?" Harry then described how they arranged Malfoy to try enslaving her, their activities at the meetings, how he had saved her from Malfoy when he had abducted her and their all day activities. He did not go into the details though for he did not want everyone to know that they had a mental connection and were able to perform wandless magic.

The judge went on. "If there no objections you are cleared from this charge. However, you have also been charged with attacking a muggle four years ago." Harry remembered. He had blown up his 'aunt' Marge that summer.

"But, sir, the then minister of magic already cleared me of the charges."

"I am well aware of that. This is why you had not been called to court earlier but recently we could no longer find the document he had signed. Until we find it, we will have to assume it does not exist", the judge explained smiling, "Do you have any prove that the described event did not happen?"

"No, sir", Harry responded subdued.

"Then your penalty will be: 12 months in Azkaban. Note that it usually would have been the suspension from your current wizarding school, but for you are no off age the case will be treated as if you had committed the crime at this age", the judge added grinning broadly, "Any objections?" The jurors stayed silent. Then Harry realized. He was going to Azkaban for a year. He could not stand the Dementors for more than a minute without fainting. He would literally lose his sanity. Then he felt something cold. Turning his head he saw two hooded figures approaching he wanted to scream but he could not make a sound. "Hermione! They are locking me up in Azkaban! Help!", he cried desperately through the connection before he fainted.

Hermione who had been woken by Ron when he went outside to see what had happened was sitting in the living room when she heard Harry's cries. "Harry!" She did not receive an answer, "Harry!" Hermione got angry, "Ron! Where is Harry?"

"Dad took him to the ministry", he answered anxiously. Hermione started crying. Harry, locked up in Azkaban. Because he saved her. Would she ever see him again? How long could he last there? She remembered their third year. He had always fainted when he encountered the Dementors and apparently he still did. It would make him insane, being isolated only seeing his worst fear, Dementors. She needed to talk to him and show him her life outside of Azkaban as much as possible in order to keep him sane and alive. It would be best if she live-streamed her thoughts. She was interrupted while thinking when the door opened and Mr Weasley entered. Hermione fell in rage, "Is it true? You got him into Azkaban? Answer me!"

"I did not want to, I just wanted to find out..."

"You lured him into the house to get him arrested!" At this, Hermione stormed out of the living room, summoned all her books and clothes into her trunk and ran outside. She did not want to live with such evil bastards who would lock up someone innocent in Azkaban. "Hermione! Come back!" But she had already reached the fence and disapparated to go to Harry's old hiding place.

She had never been there so she first apparated to the cave near Hogsmeade where Sirius had hidden. She cast a disillusionment charm on herself and tried to make out which of those was the second highest mountain. She decided to try a mountain with a large plateau. But as she tried to apparate there nothing happened. He must have covered the whole plateau under the apparition protection charm she concluded. So she apparated on to a rock below the plateau and climbed onto the plateau. There she found Harry's cabin and entered. She was surprised to find a large villa inside as she did not know about the extension charm. She found a room with a comfortably looking bed a desk and a wardrobe. She suspected this room to be meant for guests so she decided to stay there.

She spent the next hours trying to contact him and to organize herself. Was she returning to Hogwarts? She could talk considerable less with him there and she did not know how much it would take to keep him sane. And will the ministry keep it a secret that they imprisoned Harry? They had been trying to get rid of him for a long time but they surely would receive a huge backlash, even if it is just for the fact that they have imprisoned someone that young in Azkaban. Then how would she explain his absence? She would need to coordinate that with the Weasleys. Was there maybe still a way to get him out of Azkaban? After all, he was innocent. But they needed proof. And the only way to prove his innocence is having him questioned under Veritaserum. So why would they question him again if they had already come to the conclusion that he is guilty?

Suddenly Hermione had an idea. It was stupid, foolish and risky. What if he broke out of Azkaban? If he stayed at Hogwarts the ministry would not dare arrest him, especially if she threatened them to publicize that they had only imprisoned him because Harry had stated his plan to become minister of magic and they had been afraid because he was a very powerful wizard who had even managed to break out of Azkaban. She hoped that even if they publicized the reason for his imprisonment that the people would not realize that she could be controlled by Harry, or at least that the ministry expected the people to behave that way. If she wrote rhetorically convincing enough he would be safe, at least while he was at Hogwarts where everybody saw that he is not a criminal.

But the plan was still totally stupid. How was he even going to break out of Azkaban? Even if he gets to the point where he just needs to leave, he was no Animagus, the Dementors would sense him leaving the island. But he had fought of dozens of Dementors before and back then he had been in third grade and not even half as skilled as he was now. Taking out a stack of paper she began planning. From time to time she had to look something up in a book. After ninety minutes she was ready. She needed to discuss it with Harry. It would be best if they started as soon as possible so Harry would not lose to much power in Azkaban. Hermione tried to contact him but he did not respond, she therefore started studying to distract herself and tried to contact Harry in an interval of five minutes. It was several hours later and the night was about to start when she finally heard Harry's voice.

"Hermione." Harry seemed as if he was in a trance.

"Harry I have a plan. A plan for you to break out", she said firmly.

"Hermione. I don't think I am able to do it. I don't think I am able to do anything. To feel happy. It is horrible", Harry whispered barely audible.

"Harry, you can do this. Just think of how you will be able to go to Hogwarts."

"Sorry, I will try. What is your plan?", Harry asked a bit less weak.

Hermione told him her thoughts. "Hermione, I know, I will have to try, but I don't think I will be able to do it. Even outside the influence of the Dementors it is highly difficult."

"Harry. You need to erase your mind from any doubts, from anything negative. Harry. Think of what you want the most to achieve in your life. You will feel an immense amount of motivation."

"Right. I think we should start right now. The wizards who brought me here have left again and to not become crazy I am going to leave this place as soon as possible."

"Harry, you can't go crazy. Sirius never went crazy either. Because he knew that he was innocent. And furthermore, I will spend as much time as I can talking to you and showing you my life. But still I agree."

Hermione went looking for Harry's room where he opened his trunk and took Draco's wand which Harry had won in their duel last term and disapparated. The cliff on which she reappeared was very windy. She placed Draco's wand on the ground and told Harry that she was ready. She send him also an emotive message through the connection containing the most intense happiness she could imagine. Hermione attentively watched the wand which a few seconds later accelerated toward the sea. Knowing she would have to wait some time she cast a wind protection and a warmth charm and sat down. "I got it!", Harry called several minutes later to which Hermione responded with another load of happiness.

Harry had had to concentrate all his magical power to pull that off. He had cast a wandless "Accio Draco's Wand" which flew over five miles toward Azkaban. He now had caught the wand and removed the chains which were luckily ordinary muggle ones. He transfigured the chains into a small wooden boat and blew up the wall behind him which was luckily the outermost wall of Azkaban. Now he needed to be quick. He levitated the boat into the water and jump down after stopping his fall with "Arresto Momemtum". The Dementors had apparently not noticed anything yet so he quickly spelled the boat to accelerate toward the coast. Harry had barely traveled 20 meters when he suddenly felt this unpleasant familiar coldness.

The Dementors had sensed him leaving the prison and now there were about twenty sweeping toward him. He quickly sent Hermione a picture of the Dementors before he concentrated intensely on the happiest thought that he could think of and cast "Expecto Patronum". The stag emerged from the tip of his wand and jumped lightly toward the Dementors. Upon seeing him being armed the Dementors called for reinforcement and suddenly at least two hundred Dementors filled the skies. While concentrating hard on holding up the Patronus Harry sent another picture to Hermione. He knew he could not fight two hundred Dementors at once, he needed help. While Harry continued speeding away from the island the water behind him was freezing because of the immense amount of Dementors following him. Just as Harry felt his Patronus getting weaker he received another load of happiness from Hermione and he reinforced his Patronus at which the number of Dementors drastically decreased. Slowly the coast came in sight. Harry was tempted to just disapparate but he knew he would be in trouble if he tried to disapparate inside the disapparition protection charms. Slowly he realised he would not have to stay in Azkaban and with his hope his patronus grew stronger and stronger. The small number of Dementors who were still following him quickly decreased. When Harry was only a few hundred meters away he saw another Patronus in shape of an otter swimming toward him. At the sight of the second Patronus the last few Dementors returned to Azkaban. Harry slowed down his boat when he reached the coast and climbed onto a small rock below the moonlit cliff. Frightened that the Disapparition protection charms might reach up to the cliff he transfigured the boat into a rope and levitated one end up to the cliff end climbed upwards, away from the water. Waiting for him Hermione stand on the cliff smiling in relieve but she looked as if she had cried. "Let's get away from here as quickly as possible", Hermione whispered, "To your hiding place?" Harry nodded and they both disapparated.


	7. Chapter 7

**Chapter 7:**

As Hermione had climbed onto the plateau she instantly fell into a hug with Harry. "I have missed you so much. I was so worried. You. In Azkaban. Because of me!", she sobbed. Harry just gently smiled at her feeling finally safe. They silently hold the hug in the moonlight until they broke it after over two minutes. "You need to heat up. You are terribly supercooled", Hermione said in a worried tone, "And you need chocolate. I think I have some in my trunk." They went into the seemingly way too small cabin. When they both were sitting in the living room lit by the fireplace Hermione passed him the chocolate. He quickly broke off a few pieces with still trembling hands. As he ate them his mind slowly cleared. He felt demolished. "Harry, don't worry. You are safe now", Hermione said softly. He smiled sadly and responded with a hollow voice, "I will never be able to go to Hogwarts again. To see my friends there. To find a job." He broke into tears.

"Harry, they cannot lock you up when you are at Hogwarts without raising attention. And if they do they have to do another hearing where they can't lock you up for something you did not do because everyone would know. Else they would lose the trust from every British witch or wizard."

"Hermione. They did not lock me up for the bond. They found out under Veritaserum that I am innocent. But they did some weird tricks. They said they could no longer find Fudge's document in which he let me off my charges for attacking my aunt in third year. Then the penalty would have just been being expelled from Hogwarts. But for some reason they could treat the crime as if I had committed it at the age I am now, so seventeen, off age." Hermione was shocked, "That cannot possibly be legal. Didn't the jurors say anything?"

"There were only four jurors or so. I think they and the judge had been ordered to get me locked up, no matter how. I would not be the first time that the ministry tried to get me out of the way", Harry added angrily, "We will have to do some research to find the according articles."

"Do you have any statute books?"

"No", he answered.

"Me neither."

"We'll have to buy them then", Harry decided.

"No. I will buy them. The Aurors and probably Dementors are looking for you." She shuddered at the thought of the Dementors.

"Thank you. That you sent me so much happiness. I could never have fought that many Dementors. And even less not after a several hours ride with them accompanying me."

"No problem. After all you were in there because of me."

"No. I was there because of me. I decided to help you so I was there because of me." Hermione smiled. He was still the same. For a while they just sat there and enjoyed the peace. Both quickly got tired from the dim light and the silent crackling of the fire. Harry wanted to get up to his sleeping room but Hermione stopped him, "Please, don't go away. Stay here for a moment."

"Hermione, I'm tired. I just want to go to sleep."_"Please. Harry, you don't know how I felt during the time you were unconscious. Horrible. I did not know how long you would have to stay there. Would we ever meet again? I did not if you were even still alive." The last she whispered barely audible. Harry had never thought of this. While he had been oscillating between unconsciousness, waking up and fainting again Hermione had been left completely in the dark with only the information that he was going to Azkaban. Hermione silently cried, "How could he do that? Mr Weasley had known you for years and he sent you to Azkaban even though he knew you were innocent."

"I don't know. I don't want to know. I just hope the rest of the family is not like him", he responded depressively.

"Harry. Please promise me to never trust them again. After such an betrayal."_"Hermione. I can't. They have been my family. My only family apart from Sirius. I am not able to believe that they have turned against me."

Hermione nodded understandingly. "Just be careful. And please never leave without telling me." Harry nodded. He was happy to finally be able to talk about his feelings to someone.

Not wanting to leave her alone now he tried to do tool-free Divination. He spread his magic across the room and waited to discover any vision. He caught a few emotive visions. These contained a feeling of triumph and excitement but he could also feel some traces of love. He was relieved not to feel anything that would indicate more trouble. He continued to hold up his net of magic that he had spread throughout room. While Hermione slowly began breathing more slowly Harry sensed a vision. Excited he mentally concentrated on where he had sensed the vision. Slowly an image formed in his head. When it was complete Harry saw himself on the Hogwarts Express. He was sitting in a compartment opposite to Hermione and Ron was standing in the doorway smiling friendly, apparently about to join them. Harry smiled contently. Not only had he made some major progress but he also knew that at least Ron would eventually accept Harry's innocence. Glancing to Hermione he noticed that she was asleep so he too closed his eyes.

Harry woke up the next morning to an owl flying in front of the window. Hermione was still asleep so he quietly got to the window and took the letter. It was from Mr Weasley. Harry felt an urge to simply rip it apart when he read the name of the sender. He lay the letter on the table not wanting to deal with it now and went outside looking further down the mountain for something edible. After half an hour he was carrying four apples and some mushrooms that he had spell-checked to be non poisonous. He returned to the extended cabin and went into the kitchen where he enlarged the food. He then prepared a rather odd breakfast which contained both fried mushrooms as apples and apple juice. While he was waiting for Hermione to wake up he started his physical workout. He decided to do it outside because of the formidable view on the Hogwarts valley. After half an hour Hermione woke up and Harry returned inside while magically washing his clothes with a simple Aguamenti followed by a drying spell.

"Hi Harry"

"Hi Hermione. I have tried to prepare some breakfast but there was not that much to select from so it's a rather odd combination", he said smilingly as he went into the kitchen.

"I'll join you in a minute", Hermione said and went off to her room to get changed. "The fried apple splices are really nice", Hermione complimented when they had set down to take their breakfast.

"Thanks. Hermione?" She knew that what he was going to say would be important. "Mr Weasley has sent another letter and I haven't read it yet. I think I'll get it now."

"Let's deal with that later. You can't think properly without having eaten anything." Harry nodded in relieve since he did not actually want to read this letter fearing what he was probably threatening with and so did Hermione apparently.

They returned to the living room after breakfast to read the letter together.

"Stop. We should first check it on any curses."

"Sure, though the protection charms should have prevented it from getting inside if it was jinxed. But let's not risk it." After casting a few charms on it they decided that it was safe to open.

_Dear Harry Potter,_

_First off, I offer you my deepest apologies. The whole situation is rather complicated so I am just going to have to describe to you my point of view of the events of the last days._

_When I lured you into the Burrow I did not intend to get you locked up in Azkaban since this was legally impossible even if you committed the crime I accused you with over the last days. But more about that later. I wanted to prevent you from escaping in case the Veritaserum would not prove your innocence. Apart from that it was the only way to get Veritaserum since despite what I said, I am not in the possession of it. The third reason is that I expected you to get thrown out of Hogwarts if you were guilty which would allow Hermione a safe place, out of reach from you. But luckily, this is not the case. From that point all went wrong. The ministry who had had the plan to get you out of the way for quite some time as you know used this confidential trial as a chance to lock you up. By the way, you do not have to have any worries about the jurors, the assistant or the judge spilling the secret as they were required to put a magical oath on keeping the contents of trial a secret and only talk about the outcome as it is obligatory for a confidential trial. I assume that this all had been coordinated by the minister as well as the sudden disappearing of Fudge's document. However there is hardly anyway to prove it. Nevertheless, I tried to convince the judge to lower the penalty but he kept refusing._

_In the following night I received an owl from the ministry ordering me along with most other employees to a secret emergency conference. Everyone had to put an oath on the secrecy of the conference. Well, I simply did not do it which stayed unnoticed since all one hundred or so employees had to give it at the same time. According to the minister, a powerful dark wizard had broken out of Azkaban and was on its way to seek revenge. They said they did not know who it was as other cells had been damaged too during the outbreak which led to a chaos that had not been resolved yet. Because of the Dementors being blind they could not describe who it was that had escaped. It was still unclear to them how he had escaped. The Dementors had talked about an explosion and that they had followed him when he fled over the water leaving the prison temporary nearly unguarded. They were however not able to catch the fugitive. He had cast such a powerful Patronus that about five Dementors had been chronically damaged and were no longer able to stand guard over Azkaban which is something that has been documented only once in history. But there had been more. Suddenly the Patronus had reached an immense level of power. This actually killed one Dementor which was thought to be impossible. Fifty others had been chronically damaged. Upon that most Dementors had returned to the prison. A few still had tried to catch him but had surrendered a few seconds later when a second Patronus had attacked them. The minister ordered us to report any sign of that wizard as this man was more dangerous than any person alive. He stressed that we should come to the ministry immediately to prevent him from joining Voldemort._

_I imagine that you were that wizard because it was only a few hours after your arrest and it would explain why they kept his name a secret. If this is true I advise you not to return to Hogwarts as the Aurors and Dementors will be looking for you more intense then they had been looking for Sirius. However, there is one way to get out of this situation. What the judge had done in court had not been legal in any extent. It is simply not lawful to decide the sentence based on the current age instead of his age when he did the crime. The judge had apparently coordinated that with the jurors and abused the confidentiality of the trial. If you can blackmail the ministry to publicize this scandal you might actually cause them to stop the search for you._

_I hope you take my advise seriously and that you can forgive me for getting you into this situation. At the end here is a friendly reminder that the whole Weasley family offers you their apologies._

_Sincerely yours,_

_Mr Weasley_

"What do you think of it?", Hermione asked.

"It is definitely believable. I mean, why should the Dementors have surrendered that early if they weren't in danger?"

"What about his intentions when forcing you into the hearing?"

"I don't know. I think in the muggle world it is as he said. But the wizarding laws tend to be stupid and outdated so I would not be too sure about that one. But he has a point though. I have never heard of a confidential trial but it seems like something that could exist. We really need to get some books about that."

"Harry, I'll buy them today. We need to get everything sorted before the start of terms to raise as little attention as possible."

"Yes. But please use disguising spells. They know that we have contact to each other and they know that there has been a second Patronus. They are looking for you as much as for me", Harry suggested with a worried voice. "Don't worry, you won't even recognize me yourself", she laughed.

"Here", Harry said giving her his money bag, "I don't know how expensive these books are."

"I'll repay you once I can access my vault."

"Don't be silly. The Potter vault has more than enough money. Besides, I need that books at least as much you", he waved her off.

Half an hour later Hermione was ready. "Just disapparate as quickly as possible if you think someone is following you", Harry said when Hermione was about to disapparate, "Wait a minute, Hermione." He did a quick flick with his wand, "You now apparate here directly. Then, good luck and be careful."

"I will. And you promise not to leave the protected area. Not even for food", she said smiling and with a "Goodbye" she disapparated. Harry was waiting nervously in the living room while rereading again and again Mr Weasley's letter. Harry felt a desire to just apparate to the Weasleys and reunite with them. But he knew he was risking getting put into Azkaban once more and this time he would not be that lucky. "Is everything okay?", he asked Hermione through their connection.

"Everything is fine. I'll be back in a minute." A few moments later Hermione returned with a pile of books.

"That's going to take a while", Harry said upon seeing the amount of books she had bought.

"No, there is a searching spell with which you can look for specific articles. So in fact, we should be able to write a letter to the minister in just a few hours. Let's get to work then."

"I think somewhere on the 3rd floor there is an office room." Both laughed at Harry's little knowledge about the house he had built by himself. They got to work and after a few minutes Hermione said, "I think this is the article we need. 'In case of a delayed trial, the accused must received a penalty according to the age whilst committing the crime.' That states it pretty explicitly."

"I think I found something even better. Listen: 'Every judicial document has to be saved in the archive of Department of Mysteries where it cannot be removed. Upon postal request the Department of Mysteries is obliged to hand out a magically verified copy of any document in their archive.' That pretty much covers every problem. We can write them a letter requesting the copy of Fudge's document and they are forced to send it back. With this we can legally justify my outbreak and they should have no way around it because if they deny we will publicize what they were doing."

"Brilliant."

They spent the next hour carefully formulating the letter directed at the Unspeakables. When they were done Hermione added a confidentiality charm to the letter which made it unreadable to anyone except the addressee. Harry called Hedwig who was flying somewhere in the valley and send off the letter when she arrived. Waiting for a response both started studying which at least Harry had had no time for during the last days. As Harry had left his textbooks at the Weasley's when he left from there the first time they had to arrange who would study which subject at which time. After three hours of intense studying they noticed a tapping noise from the window where an owl was flying up and down tapping her beak against the glass. "That's got to be the reply from the Unspeakables!", Harry exclaimed excited.

"Harry! Be careful. It might still be jinxed!"

"Oh, right. I'll check it." He opened the window causing the owl to drop the letter on the floor and fly away. He levitated the letter on the table and cast multiple charms on it.

"Should be fine", he said. He opened the letter and both observed the content.

"That's it. Fudge's document. Now we just need to request indulgence."

"We need to be really careful now. If we formulate it correctly we might get out of this without even an additional trial."

The sun was standing low over horizon throwing long shadows in a warm light when they had finally finished the letter and went outside to send it off. "It is beautiful, isn't it?", Harry said standing on the edge of the plateau looking at the Hogwarts castle, "I never forget the first time I walk through those doors. It'll be nice to do it again as free man." For a long time they just stood there without saying anything. It got darker and darker and Harry felt Hermione shivering. "Let's get inside and eat something. You're getting cold", he said warmly. After they had prepared and eaten the same things they had for breakfast they went into the living room and ignited the fireplace. Harry had the feeling that Hermione wanted to say something but she kept quiet. They quietly waited for an answer but as they had not received any letter when it was around midnight they decided to go to sleep.

The next day they woke up late but there still was no reply. They decided to wait until the next morning before they send another letter in which they threaten them to publicize the scandal. Because they still had only apples and mushrooms to eat they made a trip through the valley. The sky was clear without any clouds. After half an hour they found a small river where they sat down and magically caught some fishes. When they had caught five fishes they continued their trip which led them to a group of plum trees and later some pear trees. They returned to the plateau at noon now pretty hungry. They enlarged everything they had collected and prepared lunch. It tasted actually good and both were really hungry since they had not eaten much the day before and this day not at all. They were about to start studying when Hermione noticed an owl soaring toward the cabin. "Look!", she said pointing out of the window. Both hurried outside where the owl now dropped the letter and flew away. After checking the spell for any curses Hermione opened the envelope. Inside was a very formally looking document. Hermione read it and she exclaimed, "Harry, we are free!" Harry read the document and a single tear of joy rolled down his cheek.


	8. Chapter 8

**Chapter 8:**

They decided to secure the document so Harry could never be arrested for this again. After the document had been locked in a room in the basement with several protection charms they went to the Weasleys to reunite with them. They were still very afraid when they knocked. Was it yet another trap? Mrs Weasley opened the door and seemed delighted to see Harry and Hermione though you could tell she was very nervous.

"Harry! Hermione! I am so sorry we did not-"

She was interrupted by a thunder of footsteps. At once every Weasley family member was standing in front of the door. There was an awkward silence.

"It's okay, Mrs Weasley. Your husband already told us about everything in a letter. So as long as you were just concerned about Hermione there is no reason to be sorry about it." The faces relaxed a little.

"Harry, Hermione, I need to talk with you. Can we go to the kitchen?", Mr Weasley asked seriously.

"Sure."

"I assume you negotiated with the ministry to let them drop the charges? Because we got the note that this powerful wizard has been arrested."

"Yeah, kind of. The thing is, that the judge broke the age law wasn't everything that was wrong with the hearing. They said they had lost the document Fudge had signed to drop my charges. But we found out that every judicial document is saved in the archive of the Department of Mysteries as well. This way we got them to confirm us in an official document that the penalty of the trial has been recalled."

"Okay that is some good news. But there is still a problem: The ministry is now trying even harder than before to get control over you. They fear that you might have turned to the dark side and either plan on being the next Dark Lord or form allies with Voldemort."

"Why would they think that?"

"Harry, you have killed a Dementor. They assume you did it with dark magic which would mean that you have advanced in the Dark Arts further than anything else. After all they know about our bond", Hermione reasoned. The last part she said through the connection to avoid breaking the taboo.

"Exactly. But you said you did not do it with dark magic, then how did you do it?"

"Did you actually think I was a master of the Dark Arts?", Harry asked seemingly offended to avoid giving away information on their bond.

"I did not mean it that way I just could not think of any other way..."

"It was a Patronus charm and Hermione's help, that's all I can tell you."

"Well, I am certainly relieved that you are not into the Dark Arts. But could you tell more about your outbreak? I mean, you are the second person to ever have done it." Harry asked through the connection if he should tell Mr Weasley to which Hermione responded, "I think we can trust him. And showing him this will help rebuilding the friendship to Weasleys." Harry thus responded, this time out loud, "I summoned Draco's wand which I had gotten from him in our duel. Hermione had brought to the coast so it would be easier for me. Once I had it I blew up the wall and transfigured the chains from my cell into a boat with which I fled."

"So you summoned your wand without a wand over multiple miles?", Mr Weasley asked impressed but also very anxious and Harry realized how powerful he looked like in their eyes, "But how did you coordinate that with Hermione?"

"I really can't tell you. I assume you still have not read anything about this specific topic?"

"Slave bonds? No, I haven't."

"Well, it would really explain a lot of things to you that can't explain."

"I'll do so if I ever got the chance. But I think we should rejoin the rest of my family."

Harry and Hermione spent the rest of their holidays at the Burrow. At first everything seemed kind of strained and the Weasleys seemed to fear Harry might want to take revenge on them for betraying him but they slowly rebuilt their trust in each other. They also celebrated Harry's birthday which had been actually the day after the Weasleys first found out about the slave bond. Ron had secretly given Harry _Twelve Fail-Safe Ways to Charm Witches_, a book with flirting tips which he had previously been given by Fred and George. They themselves gave him huge load of products from their joke shop. Hermione gave him a new Sneakoscope which she had bought earlier the holidays but forgot it at the Weasleys' when she left to save Harry. Ginny gave him a magical razor that would give you a perfect shaving upon command and she could not keep herself from commenting laughing, "You definitely needed it." The most interesting gift was from Mrs Weasley. It was a wizarding watch like the one from Dumbledore which was a pain to read because its many functions and therefore many hands. It was a tradition to give a watch to a witch or wizard when they come off age which Harry had of course never heard of.

All in all they almost felt as if these few days had never existed. They returned helping Mrs Weasley in the garden and in the kitchen, playing Quidditch and at least Hermione and Harry studying often together. Harry first wanted to drop Divination as he was afraid to foretell more things like he had in his practical exam but Hermione reasoned with him to keep it, "Remember, it would have happened anyway, no matter if you had prophesied it or not. Your prediction just helped you preparing yourself for it. And besides, you did not have only negative predictions, right?" Remembering the vision of Ron, Hermione and him on the Hogwarts train he agreed. The previous enmity had left scares though since Mrs Weasley seemed to manage that Hermione and Harry were never alone in one room. Not that it mattered as they could still talk to each other but Harry noticed slightly disappointed that it meant she still did not trust him.

"Can't Harry and me just talk a bit? Ron himself seems annoyed that you constantly want me to play wizarding chess with him even though I don't really like the game", Hermione one day complained to which Harry carefully added, "Why do you want to keep us from each other?" Mrs Weasley sighed, "I'm sorry. Don't think I don't trust you, Harry. But I am a bit sensitive when it comes to _this_ topic. Back when I was in Hogwarts there been a student, a friend of mine, who, well, who- who was also in a bond", Mrs Weasley stuttered with slightly wet eyes, "It was a Ravenclaw and he seemed to be quite nice so I thought they were just dating. But one day in Defense against the Dark Arts we were studying Boggarts. When it was her turn on it, the Boggart turned into this Ravenclaw boy. She instantly cast Riddikulus on it but I saw how it was tapping with his wand on a red ring. Well, after some research I found out about it and... I was shocked! He must have raped her and beaten her if he was her biggest fear. And I had always thought they were dating. They kept it a secret and no one could have guessed there was something off. I was desperate. I wanted to help her but there was nothing I could do! The bond is unbreakable and even if I get him locked up in Azkaban he would still control her." She was sobbing now.

"I tried to spend as much time with her as possible but I noticed how she was getting more and more desperate. I always had to come home for Christmas but she stayed at Hogwarts this year because her parents were on a trip to America. When I heard that the Ravenclaw boy stayed there as well I knew it would be the literal hell for her so I tried to persuade my parents but in the end there was no way of me staying at Hogwarts. I wrote to her everyday to keep her as happy as possible but..." She choked, "It wasn't enough. New Year's Eve I received two letters which arrived for some reason at the same time. In one my friend just thanked me for all my support. But there was something written on the back. 'I'm sorry'. Then I noticed that there were tears all over the letter. Panic-struck I opened the other letter. It confirmed my worst fear", she was whispering now, "She had- had... she had ki- killed herself. Jumped down the staircase." Harry and Hermione were shocked. Especially since Hermione had just avoided the same fate by enslaving herself to Harry, no twelve hours before Malfoy tried it himself. Had Harry not followed her to the library that evening she would have inevitably become Malfoy's slave and eventually ended up most likely committing suicide. It was just now that both of them realized how lucky they had been.

"I'm sorry", Harry said quietly.

"You don't have to. It is just that I'm- It is just that this has scarred me forever. I know that Hermione is perfectly fine but I'm just to afraid of it happening once more, right in front of my eyes. I don't think I have properly apologized for it but I hope you understand why I was so angry when I first found out an- and cast Cruciatus curse", shivered at that thought, "Harry, please forgive! I just assumed you had done the same to Hermione! It was a huge mistake", she whimpered.

"It is okay. I understand and I will never tell anyone." Seemingly relieved Mrs Weasley hurriedly turned to leave, "I need to cook now!"

The rest of the holidays passed away peacefully. Mrs Weasley now seemed much more heartly to Harry; talking with them about it seemed to have helped her a lot processing her trauma. The last Thursday before the start of term Harry, Ron, Hermione and Ginny went to Diagon Alley accompanied by Mr Weasley. While shopping they met Neville, Dean and Luna who were also buying their new books. Later they visited the twins at the joke shop and ate ice cream at Florean Fortescue's Ice Cream Parlour. They enjoyed their last days of the holidays by playing Quidditch and Exploding Snap. On Sunday 31st August, the last day before they would return to Hogwarts the usual chaos began. Ron could not find his new Potions book, Hermione was still missing he lipstick and Harry was looking everywhere for his box of quills while Ginny had somehow lost her Hogwarts uniform. At eleven o'clock they had found everything and were ready to leave for Hogwarts the next day.

The next morning after breakfast they apparated to platform 9¾ where the red old train that would bring them to Hogwarts was already waiting. As usual the platform was completely packed.

"I'm gonna miss this annual train ride so much", said Harry when he realized that this was one of his last times to mount the train.

"Yeah, me too", agreed Hermione dreamily.

"You are mental. I will celebrate the day I no longer have to write a one-hundred-foot long Potions essay", Ron laughed. They were for the first time not late to get on the train so they quickly found an empty compartment for them three. The train started moving and soon they were traveling through autumnal forests. After about an hour Ron got up. "I'll go see Dean and Seamus, they have told me in a letter that they wanted to show me something", he said while standing in the doorway smiling friendly. Harry recognized the situation. He had predicted this in his cabin near Hogwarts the night after he had broken out of Azkaban. But he had not realized that Ron was about to leave; he had assumed Ron was about to sit down.

"Can I ask you something?", Hermione asked as Ron leaved and they were alone.

"Sure."

"What did you think of when you cast your Patronus the night you broke out of Azkaban?"

"I- I thought of me and my parents. Reunited", he added. Hermione smiled. After a while she continued, "No, you didn't. How long have I known you? I know when you are telling the truth and when not." Harry blushed.

"It's okay. You should not answer if you don't want to. Just remember what I told you last term: 'You can tell me everything. I would never make fun of you if you seem to take whatever it is seriously'" Harry kept silent for a moment then he took a deep breath and smiling nervously he said, "I thought of you. Just of you." Harry blushed once more.

"I love you", Hermione whispered, "Not just as a friend. Harry, I don't care what Mrs Weasley will think. I don't care if I am your slave. As long as it makes us stay together I would do anything. I am yours!" She seemed to have wanted to tell him for a long time when her confession burst out of her. She was smiling excitedly in his eyes and her look became more and more nervous as Harry did not respond. Harry was overwhelmed. He had been dreaming of Hermione for an eternity but he never thought a relationship would be possible. They were such good friends, she would not want him as a boyfriend he always thought. She had been dating Krum, a world class Quidditch player. How would he ever live up to that? And when he enslaved her he knew all chances were gone. Hermione was the opposite of a slave and would never even think of showing any type of affection towards him who was theoretically her master. But here they were.

"I love you too", Harry confessed finally. With a cry of joy Hermione fell into his arms.

A single tear of joy rolled down her cheek and united with Harry's tear as he and Hermione were absorbed in a long-awaited kiss.

**End**


End file.
